Salvation
by emeraldine087
Summary: Written between GoF & OoTP. H/D. Amidst death, torture, pain and betrayal, Harry finds out from an unexpected source that there can be hope in suffering, love in despair and deliverance in captivity. But is love enough to redeem him and his beloved?
1. Chapter 1

**Rating:** PG for this part but it's going to get more violent**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** THIS IS IT, FOLKS!!! The once lost story that was re-discovered. Not sure how it will be received but I don't mind flames and rotten tomatoes. **Written between GoF and OoTP, disregards the last three books.** So you can tell how long ago it was written. Harry alternates with Draco. **Never before posted anywhere**. I got scared to put it up. **Reviews are most welcome**. Chapter updates won't take as long as in DREAMCATCHER, but **I do need a beta ****(****one who specializes in first person-present tense** to edit this one, as this is all over the place!) This is the first time I ever attempted to write in the first person-present perspective, so it's bound to be ugly. Please bear with me. Two more chappies are up so you will know exactly how ugly this baby is going to get (perspective-, tense- and plot-wise).

I am currently writing another novel-length one, so to keep you guys busy while waiting for it, I decided to post this one. But as always, I am wading through a cesspool of confusion and apprehension regarding certain life choices right now. So the new story needs a great deal of inspiration and some time to be pondered over.

Every chapter of this piece will be dedicated to one person and this one's dedicated to **Kat Aglibot**.

SALVATION: CHAPTER ONE

Shrieking. Endless screaming in my ears. Deafening.

How?

Even until now I would ask. How could he have done that? We trusted him. I trusted him but he threw that all away. I thought he had changed. That somehow he had forgotten his family ties and his relation to an ass-merciless bastard. I guess it never really occurred to me that he was always, _always _going to be another bastard, like his father. I had underestimated his cunning. Who would have known that all along, he had just been waiting to strike and give us all away?

The bastard.

I will never forgive him. Because of him Neville's dead; Seamus is dead and the Resistance is deluded with a fucked-up prophecy. He once believed in the prophecy. He almost had me convinced. He told me he believed that the Resistance was useless without me. But I should have known better than to believe him. If I see him again, what would I say? Should I punch him, kill him or just insult him? He was never greatly affected by my lame insults and someone with a strong personality like his would probably never be affected.

I ought to punch him.

For him to know exactly how I feel about his betrayal.

I don't even understand why it's so painful.

~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~

He will never know why I had to do what I did.

For him, I just fucked him up; led him off to a fool's paradise and threw him away like a rag doll. He'd never understand. He would never know how much I had wanted to kill myself when I discovered that my own father had used me to know how the Resistance moved and where they were. He would never know how much I regretted ever falling for the Dark Lord's trap.

But it's too late now. Even if I want to break away, I'm in too deep.

And it's not very likely that he'd still accept me after what I had done—after what he _thought_ I had done. I once told him before how much his friendship meant to me, that I'd die first before betraying him and Professor Dumbledore. But what had happened couldn't have happened any other way.

I should look on the bright side.

He hates me. I'm a pledged Death Eater for Lord Voldemort. I'm a traitor to the people who ever really gave me reason to live. I don't know what's going to happen when the Death Eaters invade Hogsmeade, whether I die or I live with dignity upon my name. Whether I get to see him again and ask for his forgiveness—better yet—_beg_ for his forgiveness.

How do I convince him to believe in me when everything I had worked so hard for for him to trust me before had gone down the tubes?

Who am I kidding?

There's no bright side.

~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~

Cho Chang.

Am I going to lose her, too? What am I going to do? I've already lost Neville and Seamus. I've already lost _him_; can I handle another loss? She means the world to me. We're going to get married someday, probably after the war. Once peace prevails, we will get married and have a dozen kids. One day… But will that day come? I can't lose her. There has to be another way to evacuate Hogsmeade and persuade her to go with us to Munich to hide out there for a while. But if I know Cho, she will ask to stay and take care of the people. Do I even have the balls to ask her to choose? And what if she doesn't choose me?

Why is every decision a matter of life and death? Why does everyone have to be sacrificed? They're not sacrificial lamb—they're not bait. But why do they insist on becoming one for the sake of protecting me? I _am_ Professor Dumbledore's secret-keeper, but—

Hell, no!

This is not about that godforsaken prophecy again! I don't believe it, so why should they?

I made the gross mistake of almost believing in it before because of _him_…but I paid dearly for it. The prophecy is a lie. How I wish I can make them believe that. I just don't think I can handle losing another person that matters to me, like I lost Draco.

Like I'm losing Draco.

Over and over again.

~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~

I've given up crying a long time ago. Malfoys don't cry and I have no reason to change that undeniable fact. Besides even if I want to, the person I'm willing to bawl like a newborn over would think I'm just pulling another fast one on him. But since the day I fell for the Dark Lord's trap, I haven't thought of anything better to do but entertain the possibility of crying as if tears would even have the power to take away the pain of having let Harry down.

I never did cry though, at least not overtly. I wouldn't want my father to have the satisfaction of knowing that he had beaten me. That he has me again by the balls, like he always had.

And I never really liked the taste of my tears. They tasted tangy. Bitter. Sharp against my taste buds as if every drop of it was pure venom. It always reminded me of blood—without the scarlet—but always with the pain. Sometimes, I think it's even better to bleed yourself to death than live everyday of your life crying for things you would've wanted taken back—but alas… Maybe one of these days I will finally break. Maybe…one of these days I will cry to let it all out. Maybe one of these days—tomorrow or the day after that—I will find the courage to cry and accept that no matter how hard or how long I do, it'd be useless.

Harry will never see me cry. He will never believe that the tears are real.

Because I never cry.

Probably I never will.

~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~~

Shut up! Shut up!

I can't stop the screaming in my head. It's there like a splinter in my mind, making me go crazy. _Shut up!_ But the voices rise a pitch higher like a broken record as if mocking my weariness. I don't deserve any of this! I don't! Most of the time I'd just lock my head between my hands, crush my temples and scream as loud as I can to drown out the voices, the eerie voices screaming and screaming for me, screaming because of me…

Surrey.

Glasgow.

London.

Lives lost. Battles won. Dreams crushed. A thousand people dead.

And now Hogsmeade. Everybody else is on the losing side. They die but I live. For what? For me to see more deaths? For me to witness more dreams crushed, lives lost, battles won? For what? Who's the real enemy? Voldemort kills them—so he must be the enemy… but _I_…I let them die—I let them all die while I remain alive for my purpose. So what's my purpose? To be the one to put funeral wreaths on all the coffins at mass burials tallying up all the dead bodies so I can later extract some form of payment from the bastard who killed them? But I as good as killed them! I'm alive fleeing every city, every settlement and leaving mangled bodies and a parade of funerals behind me.

Everyone is on the losing side. So who wins?

This has got to stop.

I have to stop running.

_**-emeraldine-**_


	2. Chapter 2

**Rating:** PG for this part but it's going to get more violent.**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes: Reviews are most welcome**. Harry's POV. This goes out to **Cecille Tuazon**.

SALVATION: CHAPTER TWO

"Harry—you should sit down and try to be calm," Ron tells me. Easy for him to say. He doesn't have any idea just how extreme the problem is.

"You think that's easy for me to do?" I retort, feeling the tension rising like bile inside me. No one knows exactly how I feel. Intelligence reports had come in like the plague. Voldemort was on the move. And he has his eyes on Hogsmeade.

"We should be receiving the signal to Disapparate now. We don't want to be delayed," Hermione is tense as well, looking at the face of her wristwatch as if expecting it to burst into song. While I sit there—waiting for the signal—the signal that I've grown rather tired of waiting for, practically on a weekly basis now.

Somehow the green sparks in the sky were always successful at looking exactly identical regardless of whichever city they were sent up. I've grown abysmally tired of seeing them. And I just have to say my sentiments. "Don't you get tired of seeing that friggin' signal on such a regular basis?"

"That signal is the one that _saves our life_, Harry. What are you saying?" Ron points out to me as if I've become a retard overnight.

"I know," I reply. "But, is it worth it? For you two, is it worth it to save my life while we leave a whole settlement to stew in its own juices under Voldemort's mercy?" I stand up and walk over to the nearby open window.

The day is proceeding as if it was an ordinary day, but I know—in a few hours, there is a big possibility that all of this will be in ruins and all of the people down there, oblivious to the glaring reality of war, will be dead.

"We're not going to leave these people at his mercy. We're going to leave Resistance fighters to lead them somewhere safe and protect the town until their very last breaths," Hermione replies. She looks at the hustle and bustle of the town with the littlest of pity for what we are about to leave behind.

"I'm tired of running. If Voldemort wants me, why not just surrender me and prevent all the bloodshed? Hermione, a lot of people have died already and for what? For what?"

"For the Resistance. They believe in our cause. They believe in Dumbledore; they believe in you. That you can defeat Voldemort." I've been friends with Hermione for a long time and I have always known exactly how dogmatic and stubborn she could be because of what she believes in.

But right now—I just don't see the point. "At the expense of what? Tell me—tell me exactly—how painful it was to let Neville die? How about Seamus? Describe to me exactly how it was such a waste to put so many lives at stake for one blind belief that we haven't even proven to be true?"

"Stop it, Harry. Just stop it," Ron murmurs.

The tension mounts; I know because I can feel it. Of the three of us, Ron had suffered the worst blows and the greatest losses. "Tell me, Ron—what's my worth compared to your father?"

"I said stop it! We're going to go to Munich for our protection. And that's that. My father's death was not a waste, Harry. You will avenge it a thousand-fold," Ron declares, confident while I can't do anything but snort under my breath.

I'm so tired of running. I wonder why Hermione and Ron never tire of it. I'm tired of leaving behind comrades in our cause, never to be seen or heard from again. "Where is Cho?" I change the subject abruptly, that maybe even for a minute we can all pretend that we are going to go somewhere in the Caribbean to take a long vacation.

"She's not going to come with us," Hermione points out, strangling all hopes that maybe Cho had decided to change her mind and tag along somewhere safe with us…with me…

"I'll be damned if I let her stay here. If she stays, I stay."

"Don't be a fool."

I'm not going to let her stay and risk her life for me, so I really can't give a rat's ass whether Ron thinks it's crazy. "I've never been more sane my whole life…I'm serious…you have to let me talk to her and convince her to come with us or…I stay here with her and fight," I challenge. Let's see you wiggle out of that, Hermione.

"The signal is coming any second now. We don't have time. Cho has already made up her mind. She will be staying."

But like a bell signalling the end of a boxing round, before I can even retaliate with another sarcastic threat, the door opens and Cho walks in.

"Why are you still here? The signal should have been sent up five minutes ago."

I huff and sit down again. "Maybe it's running late from coffee break," I scoff and Ron shakes his head. He probably believes it's stupid to joke around at a time like this, but what the hell—the running away and leaving a whole settlement for bait are probably the biggest jokes…

"Just a little delay perhaps," Hermione answers, still on her post by the window to keep an eye out for the highly anticipated green sparks.

"We have to talk, Cho." I stand up again and walk towards the door. "We'll be in the other room," I simply say, point blankly ignoring Ron's look of reprimand.

"We don't want further delay, Harry," Hermione protests.

I don't care. If I don't leave with Cho, then I'm not going anywhere. "Yeah, yeah. You can just yell for me."

When Cho and I are finally alone, without Ron, Hermione, green sparks and oblivious people who're as good as dead, I grasp her upper arms and squeeze. "You have to go with us," I say. Please, please—don't make me kneel down and beg because if this doesn't work, I swear I really will kneel down and beg.

"I—I can't, Harry. The people need me."

"I need you, too. I can't lose you."

"I'll be OK. We're going to evacuate as soon as you go and we are ready for V—Voldemort." Until now she hasn't completely overcome the fear of saying his name. Which makes me even more desperate to take her to Munich with me.

"If you stay, I stay." So if you die, I die with you…but I don't say it. A look of horror shines in her eyes even without hearing the last statement I only uttered in my thoughts.

"You can't stay. The Resistance will be worthless if anything happens to you!"

"Fuck that! I'm going to Munich only if you go with me otherwise I'm staying with you and if anything unfortunate happens, you guys can still go on—I'm not God! So don't give me that Messianic bullshit that everything depends on my survival!"

"Harry—don't be stubborn. Let me believe in this. Let me do my purpose," she says with tears in her eyes.

But what's your purpose Cho? "Draco believed in it, too and he almost had me convinced but look—look what he did…he was the one who betrayed all of us. Neville believed in it; Seamus believed in it as well. And they're dead—they're DEAD!" My voice breaks. I don't care. I can't let the same thing happen to you, Cho.

"If you don't let me stay and fight, then it means you don't believe in me. Now that I have a chance to protect you and fight for what I believe in, please don't be the one to discourage me. I'll be OK. You taught me well, remember? You've always been the strong one but now it's my turn and if you believe in me, then you have nothing to worry about. I will have the strength to keep on fighting if I know that you're safe in Munich…and that you'll be waiting for me," Cho murmurs, barely audible. I don't know what to say, but before I can say anything at all, tears start to fall from my eyes. Why? Why does this have to happen? I feel like all my life I've been risking the lives of all the people I love, the people who mean the world to me. What's my purpose? Why do I have to lose everyone who matters to me? What's my mission? Does it even matter if the protagonist lives but he might as well die because his reasons for living were gone?

A furious knock shatters my reverie and Hermione's muffled voice echoes, "the green sparks are up. We have to go, Harry." It is so ominous. So final. And before Cho even gets to say goodbye, I kiss her—furiously, as if I don't want to let go and be anywhere else but here, with her. I am empty—a hollow shell, I've always been. And the pain reminds me of something else—something that happened not so long ago.

But I shake off the feeling of déjà vu. All that matters is Cho. I don't have much time but what is time anyway? Just the feel of Cho's lips on mine can pass for eternity. But it's over in a heartbeat.

"Harry! C'mon!"

I break away first. I know if I go on, it will be harder for me to break away. "You should go," she whispers, but I don't move a muscle.

"You will go to Munich as soon as you can. I won't rest easy until you're beside me again. And there we can arrange our wedding," I propose. She merely nods; I can't tell if that's enough assurance that I will see her again.

Will I see you again, Cho? I dare not ask. She disentangles her hand from mine. I don't want to say goodbye, Cho. But will I see you again? It feels so eerie but the throbbing of my heart tells me so many things at the same time.

I am about to walk through the door to the other room where Ron and Hermione are when I turn my head for a last look at Cho. And I can't explain the shiver that runs up my spine. And the unfathomable fear. Fear that unconsciously tells me that I will never see her again.

The same fear I had when we allowed Draco to go back to Malfoy manor because Voldemort had held his mother hostage. And when he didn't come back—

I only let everything resurface again when I close the door on Cho. This pain, this same pain…

It's the same pain when I found out that Draco had betrayed me… And somehow it's still hurting…

"Well—let's go. Cho will follow," I declare. And once again—I'm going to run away. What do I leave behind? A past of uncertainty.

But somehow I can never run away fast enough.

_**-emeraldine-**_


	3. Chapter 3

**Rating:** PG for this part but it's going to get more violent**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** **Reviews are most welcome**. This is Draco's POV. This chapter is dedicated to **Tanya Jamon.**

SALVATION: CHAPTER THREE

They're giving me that look again.

Fuck you all—and don't get the impression that I actually chose to be here. I'd rather be in hell than be here. But I'm already in too deep. I've as good as sold my soul to the devil. But still I keep on walking. What the hell—the way they look at me is the least of my problems. A call halts me in the middle of the hallway and I turn around to see. The rest of the young Death Eaters walking with me walk on ahead in their merry way.

"Draco—"

"Father," You are the greatest fucker this world ever spat out, and I loathe having your blood run through my veins. But still, I hang my head low to show respect. Sometimes, I think that I'm still under Imperius or something. After all, the reason I still respect this bastard is beyond me. "Is there anything you want to tell me?"

"You will be at the front to subdue Hogsmeade and capture all Resistance forces left there. Dark Lord's orders." And I merely nod. What do they want me there for anyway? But no such protests come out of my lips. I wonder why they need me there but that's it—there's no use trying to make a point with my father.

"Make me proud," he says before turning his back on me and walking away, cloak swaying, with his eternally present swagger. Yeah right. Make you proud by what? Killing a few people and bringing their decapitated heads to you for souvenir? I don't know why I even bother with anything. My father as good as killed me long ago so I might as well do whatever he wanted. I walk towards the balcony at the far end of the hallway, mindless of the thundering of my heart. Any second now, I have to go to Hogsmeade and murder a few people. Maybe a lot of people… But I figure, I will have to take it when it comes.

Will I even see Harry there?

Whoa Draco, Don't even go there. I open the glass doors of the balcony and step out into the blissful cold. This hideout is supposed to be Unplottable, undetected by the Resistance. But the fact that I'm officially nowhere doesn't calm me in the very least. I put both my elbows on the railing and bend low to immerse myself in my thoughts. The cold comforts though. It makes me forget the infernal situation I'm in.

The voices keep on reverberating in my ears, voices that haunt me even in the daylight. And I can't filter them out because I created them. I created them to drown myself in guilt and self-blame. I'm a traitor, and I have no right whatsoever to think that things might have been different, because I chose this.

Technically, I did. I let my father trap me in a web of manipulation and betrayal. I let my guard down and by that one sorry mistake, thousands upon thousands of lives became the price. I rake a hand through my blonde hair and groan. Time is of the essence now. In less than an hour, I'd be killing innocents, so better languish myself in eternal damnation before that and then feel good that somehow, I chose this path.

Though I never succeed in convincing myself, it's always worth a shot.

"Draco," someone calls from below. I look down with dread. "It's time to go."

I stall, but I know I have to follow orders. "Yeah," I reply, and reluctantly leave the comfort of the balcony.

When we arrive without incident at the point of Disapparition, I'm livid with terror at the prospect of another massacre—and the possibility of seeing Harry again. What should I say to him if I do meet him? Will I even be able to look him in the eye and take responsibility for everything I had done? I betrayed him, not to mention, I killed Seamus and Neville in the name of Voldemort.

I raise my wand to Disapparate from the site quite a walk away from the castle and the next moment I find myself in Hogsmeade amidst the crowd of people, scampering off to different directions, clueless of our presence. The move had begun to prepare for our coming. I inwardly beamed; at least this time, they're somewhat prepared. The rest of the young Death Eaters appear one by one in the safety of our little hiding place beside an edifice, which by smart calculations, won't be kept standing for long.

"Now where's the welcoming committee?" Vincent scoffs as he appears by the far wall, closest to the main thoroughfare of stampeding people toward a slim chance of survival.

"They're prepared for us this time around, Crabbe," I intone, trying my best to keep the triumphant tone of my voice to a minimum. "There's going to be real battle this time."

"If they're hiding Potter here, there sure as hell will be one," Gregory threatens, flexing his muscles and raising his wand a little higher to try and catch people's attention.

"Think, Goyle," I sneer, sarcastically. "If they have the initiative and the foreknowledge enough to evacuate people, there's as many chances of finding Potter here as your developing a working brain cell in that brain of yours," I finish, virtually patting myself in the back for such a job well done. But underneath the façade of suaveness and unfazed certainty, I secretly start to hope that I really won't be finding Harry here.

"Who's up for the first wave?" A chorus of 'Yeah' sounds from the eager group of human killing machines upon Crabbe's question, and I nearly hurl my guts in abomination. Why am I doing this?

"Draco?" Blaise jolts me out of another session of self-blame. The rest of my group had started to ransack the building next to the alleyway, which served as our Apparition point. I knew that this building would be the first to go. By the time I enter the building, there isn't much left for me to vent my frustrations on aside from the old man and a younger woman being held hostage. The others had gone off to destroy some other edifice and disembowel the people left standing.

Crabbe clutches the young woman by the throat while Reddings holds a wand out to keep the weeping old man in check. "Please, spare my daughter. Kill me! Spare her, please!" Everything seems to shift to slow motion. All I can hear is my ragged breathing. This is crazy! But I just stand there unmoving as Crabbe strips the girl's clothes off and starts ravaging her, in front of her old father. Screaming. The voices are back again in the cradle of my raw emotions. Why do I let things like this happen?

When Crabbe is done with all the perversion privy to his limited but lecherous mind, he raises his wand and it's over in a flash of green light. The girl is dead. I hold back the impulse to hurl and close my eyes to the inhumane reality. I let it all happen—making amends by self-blame and guilt wallowing is never going to be enough. Every crime I did and had let happen in front of me that had gone unpunished will haunt me forever.

The sight of the old man in noisy tears strikes the dormant chords of my heart I had long silenced. I feel I can identify with him—we are, after all, both there but we didn't do anything… we couldn't do anything…

Crabbe re-fastens his robes with a smug smile. You bastard—you dirty scum. "We'll join the others, Draco. Finish _him_ off," Crabbe points a finger at the old man, tied up behind his back with thick ropes, leaning over the body of his young daughter. By his knees are shards of glass and what look like remains of wands. It will be very easy. But the hard part will be to look into the eyes of my victim—the eyes of a bereaved father, of a pained, suffering father who never expected this to be the end.

"I want to spare you, old man. Because I know this is not the most ideal way to die. I would have wanted you to have a chance to try and defeat me and die an honorable death, defending your life and your daughter's. I'm sorry for what they did to her, but I couldn't have stopped them. I don't know how to make amends, but—"

"Kill me—finish off my suffering. I failed to defend my daughter as a father should. That's how _I_ can make amends. Death—death is the only way I can free myself from the guilt, when I join my daughter," he interrupts. There are tears in my eyes, the same tears I had cried in secret for all the deaths my hand had caused.

"When you see your daughter, tell her that she's lucky she did not suffer long."

Green light. Choked words. It's done again. I am a murderer. And maybe the old man was right; only in death can I make amends.

My wand shakes in my hand, and a voice echoes from it. The Interlocution Spell. "Draco! Hurry—we're at the robes shop. Potter's here! He's with the Chang girl!"

_**-emeraldine-**_


	4. Chapter 4

**Rating:** PG for this part but it's going to get more violent**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** **Reviews are most welcome**. By the way, this story is set about 8-9 months from the end of GoF. To those who are confused, keep reading and it will all be clear... I promise... Harry's point of view right here. **DJ Ibay**, this is for you. In case, you missed it--this is posted in its unbeta-edited glory. Apart from my own poor efforts of editing my own work, no one else has touched this. So if anyone is good in editing the first-person/present perspective, give me a hoot! **Character death** in this chapter, but this is just the beginning... -cue suspense-thriller music-

SALVATION: CHAPTER FOUR

I ditch Hermione and Ron at the first opportunity and decide to go back to Hogsmeade behind their backs. They are still probably waiting for me to come out of the bathroom… But I had to do it. I failed miserably to convince myself that I could just turn my back on Cho and the whole town.

The town is on the move. Everyone is running towards different directions, mindless of my presence. There are screams and chaos; explosions rock the nearby buildings. The first wave of terror had probably begun. My whole body shakes but I keep on walking, without a clear direction as to where I want to end up. I want to kill as many Death Eaters as possible; I know the wrath in me is enough to wipe them all out. Debts had to be paid. In full. They took lives, and so I would avenge those lives they have taken. If only I can kill them over and over again.

I'm sorry, Hermione. I know the risks you have taken to keep me safe. But somewhere between Draco's betrayal and the self-sacrifices that were made, I realize that I have to stop running. I'm sorry, Ron. But I swear that my promise still stands, Voldemort will pay someday; I just don't know whether I'd be the one to avenge your father's death for you.

And now, my decision is final. Deaths have to stop. If my own death is the only way to put a stop to all other unnecessary deaths, then so be it.

"Cho! Where are you?" I yell at the top of my lungs but I know that my feeble voice will never be heard above the din of confused and terrified screams. Debris is scattered as well as fallen bodies and blood. Blood that need not have been given… "Cho! Cho! Cho!" A hand yanks me off the main thoroughfare of panicking people and pulls me into an alley. My hand prepares to strike. I'd not be killed easily, that's for sure.

"Harry! What are you still doing here?" Cho is chalk-white with shock and fear. Her robes are smothered with blood. "Harry—you should not have come back. It's too dangerous for you to be here!" Right now I don't care anymore. "Cho…I've made up my mind. I'm fighting with you. And there's nothing you can do to convince me otherwise. This is not because I don't trust you—but I can't keep silent for long, sacrificing lives not meant to be sacrificed to run away and protect myself. I'm doing this, because like you, I know now what my purpose is."

"And what is that?"

"To protect the people who matter to me. If you believe in me, you will let me fight with you…you will let me protect you." The pain of my decision grinds my soul and yet, there is nothing else left for me to do. Nothing left for me to say. Cho breaks into tears and embraces me with such fierce abandon that the town's chaos blends into a passing mosaic. I close my eyes to feel the beating of Cho's heart against my chest; the rest of the world cease to exist. There are no panicking people, no bloodbath, no deaths, nothing else but the moment that may never come again. "If they find you here—"

I clutch Cho's shoulders and give my strongest embrace. "I don't care. I don't…I don't know what's going to happen, but all I know is that I'd rather spend one minute of my life protecting the people who mean the world to me even at the expense of my own life than spend what's left of it running from what I should have been doing all along."

Hurried footsteps rush past us but I keep my head down. I fear, too. But I've been afraid for too long. The ache in my heart slowly begins ebbing away. "We have to help as many people as we can. The first wave of terror is over; it's about to get worse." Cho nods.

The people rush past us in torrents. Cho and I inch through the throngs of people, bloodied and hurt, doing all that we can to help. I don't care what Hermione and Ron say, but the feeling of being here, fighting, is very, very different. To be here, with a definite cause to save the people in reality and not just in rhetoric, is a thousand times better than hopping from one city to another, promising the relatives of the massacred people that retribution is due and that Harry Potter, The-Boy-Who-Will-Bleed-Voldemort-Dry, would be the messiah for the people left standing. But they are only promises, unlike the actual feeling of being here—promises that may or may not be fulfilled.

I will gladly replace my privilege to live in different cities, comfortable and bruise-free with this liberation to do something for the people who have long been kept in the fathoms of promises yet to happen and pacified with visions of victory after countless bloodbaths and mass killings.

We are in another alleyway when Cho and I stop to catch our breaths for the first time since the first wave of terror ended.

Almost all buildings are destroyed; smoke from explosions and the unmistakable smell of death emanate from every nook and cranny of the town. The town is almost deserted now, save for Cho and I and a couple other elusive Death Eaters. But I don't attempt to tell Cho that we should leave. It can't be over…

It's too…easy. The Death Eaters wouldn't give up the search and destroy this easily. I'm sure their radar for the living and uncanny power to smell warm blood is not going to rest as long as there are several others like ourselves left standing. "Potter!"

And I'm right.

Crabbe, Goyle, Zabini and Reddings block the only escape out of the alleyway. Their wands are ready to strike. "You are courageous enough to show even a strand of your hair to us? You, as good as signed for the cancellation of your lease on life," Goyle declares.

"Those are really big words, Goyle. Are you sure you even understand what you just said?" I'm being very bold, all right. I know I'm treading in dangerous waters because they can kill Cho and me without so much as batting an eyelash.

"Don't underestimate me—I can kill you right here," Goyle spits out.

"It wouldn't be too easy; I assure you," I spit back, as threateningly as I can. The moment to really fight for myself and for the people I love is finally here.

Goyle raises his wand and screams a spell I don't quite catch. I duck and spin on my side towards Cho, but I feel the electrifying warmth of the spell rush past my left ear. Cho hunches, arms covering her head. "Cho! Run!"

Reddings laughs eerily and waves his wand, hurtling a spell towards Cho's direction. My breath catches in my throat. I reach out to pull her down, but the spell touches her even before I do.

Blood rushes to my ears as I watch Cho fall. She can't be dead; she can't be. My hand holds my wand tighter and I face the group of Death Eaters in blinded fury. You will not catch me easily. And Cho is not dead. Because if she is…

"_Avada Kedavra!_" I don't know the emotions swirling within me any longer, but I know that guilt over having killed a human being is not one of them—if only I can kill Reddings over again. But there is still Goyle, Crabbe and Zabini to turn my attention to.

"You—" Goyle starts to say something, but the words die in his throat.

"_Extrío Inflamaré!_" A blazing fire erupts from the end of my wand, and the three's bodies fly away from the mouth of the alleyway.

"Cho." Still breathing. Thank god. "_Enervate!_" Big brown eyes look back at me. I thought I had lost her. What would I have done if Reddings had killed her? "Cho, listen to me—go to Munich and to safety. I'll take care of this," but she shakes her head.

"No—we will finish this together and go to Munich together!"

No Cho—I can't let you risk your life like this. It's me they want…I immerse myself in her brown eyes. There is determination there. I know there is nothing I can do to stop her. But those determined eyes shift to show terror. Her breath catches in her throat all of a sudden. The liquid intensity of her brown eyes suddenly leaks fear. "NOOOOO!!!"

Everything turns into what seems to be a scene from a badly-directed movie. My mind freezes over. My back is towards the entrance of the alley but Cho embraces me and turns me around. Screams flood my brain and my eyes are blinded with a flash of bright green light…and heaviness. It's too quick and too slow at the same time. The beating of my heart stops momentarily and I start choking. And the weight of Cho's body against mine crushes me from the inside; with arms like jelly and eyes blinded by disbelief, I collapse on the dusty alley, holding her.

I close my eyes even before the smoke and dust clear to reveal my worst fears. I want to be arrested with the dull thumping of Cho's heart in the silence, but there is nothing. There is nothing but the revolution within me, the unfathomable pain and anger in me. No—this can't be happening… when I open my eyes, Cho will be looking back at me, with her sweet smile, her sweet smile full of life and vibrance…and love… A choke escapes through my lips; I don't try to stop it.

Stop crying, Harry. When you open your eyes, Cho will be there. And the peace and calm of Munich will be upon you. But a yell boils in my throat. The silence shatters to a million pieces. Into a million broken pieces of myself. I scream. I scream Cho's name. I slowly open my eyes to see for myself the hard reality. Cho is dead in my arms, her blank eyes frozen in the look of calm and surrender to death that should have been mine.

A sad sob breaks my heart open and torrents of tears start flowing. Cho died in front of me and she caught death's throes that were meant for me. I hold her close, crying in abandon. I don't care anymore if they kill me. My attention turns to the noisy sobs that my lips aren't able to hold back, the cold of Cho's hand, the empty, unblinking look of her eyes where I can see myself…where I don't want to see myself with every teardrop that falls on her cheeks and trickles down to her jaw, her neck—because I failed her. And I failed myself.

My wand lies forgotten on my side, my knees hurt from the grainy, hard cement. The smoke clears and I see the outlines of four people against the light, melting like watercolor in the rain of my salty tears. Goyle's arm is raised and his hand is pointing directly to where Cho and I stood not too long ago; Crabbe and Zabini are poker-faced; Reddings is dead at their feet; and Draco—Draco is here…

His hand is on Goyle's raised arm, as if holding on to a lifeline. In his face, his eyes, is the most inscrutable expression of all of them. I look into those eyes and I find no traces of the Draco I used to know. But for a moment I imagine a degree of pain there—equaled only by my own.

"We should finish him right here," Goyle declares, pointing his wand at me again as I kneel there, holding Cho's lifeless body. Go ahead—kill me. Then my guilt and my worthlessness will be over and I will only prove to myself that I am, and will always be, useless—because I can't even protect the people I love. Even if you do kill me—I doubt I would even feel it…

"No," Draco speaks. I don't know that voice anymore. It sounds like a stranger's. "The Dark Lord needs him," he finishes. The cold voice, the detached tone even adds to my grief. Draco doesn't want me dead because he wants me to suffer. As if my present suffering is not yet enough.

"Just kill me—now. Get it over and done with," I beg. I can't believe I just begged for them to kill me, but I did. "Please…"

Draco raises his own wand and points it at me. His eyes are shining though I don't find out why anymore. "_Stupefy!_"

_**-emeraldine-**_


	5. Chapter 5

**Rating:** PG for this part but it's going to get more violent**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** **Reviews are most welcome**. Draco's point of view this time. This is a VERY dark story which is hugely different from all of the stories I've written before. I only wanted to see if I have what it takes to write something like this, too. This is for **Aai Barber.**

SALVATION: CHAPTER FIVE

The organ inside my chest is on a rampage as Harry is dragged into the castle by Crabbe and Goyle, and so roughly, too that it's taking me a huge effort not to curse them at the way they are dragging the unconscious boy between the two of them. You frigging bastards have no right to stain Harry with your filthy hands. But I am mentally and emotionally paralyzed. I never expected that we'd actually find Harry in Hogsmeade and now my worst fears are realized: Harry has fallen into the hands of the enemy—the enemy who will never think twice about killing him. I was wrong to think that Weasley and Granger could be trusted. How can they let Harry stay behind?

"You're not supposed to hurt him, Goyle," I finally spit out, my temper flaring when Goyle starts dragging the unconscious Harry by the latter's jet-black hair.

"Says who?" Goyle sardonically retorts and it practically takes all of my willpower to stop myself from turning him into a platypus.

"Because the Dark Lord would want to have him unscathed," I exclaim, my throat constricted and my voice mildly angry. The rest of the Death Eaters in our party say nothing in defense of Goyle's actions towards the captive. The Dark Lord really said so himself that he wants Harry unblemished.

Although the reason why the Dark Lord explicitly requested that remains to be elusive.

I, for one, wouldn't put anything past him. But if he hurts Harry…

If he hurts Harry, what should I do? It's not as if there's something I _can_ do. I am a prisoner just as much as Harry is. What if he kills Harry, though? What will I do then?

I had condoned so many deaths, even perpetrated some of them—hell—a _lot_ of them…why should Harry's be any different? The tumultuous thoughts inside me are in fierce combat that I don't notice until much later how clenched my jaws are in the depths of my thoughts. The rest of the group forging their way through the labyrinthine halls of the castle eye me surreptitiously, waiting for me to show any sign of the connections I used to have with the Resistance. But I hold back the sharpness of my tongue.

Fuck you all!

I mutter curses under my breath. I _have_ to do something to get Harry out of this little piece of hell. He doesn't deserve this. But if I hadn't suggested that Harry be brought to the Dark Lord, Goyle would have killed him without batting an eyelash. I have to buy more time for him but how do I get him out of here?

Shit—Just getting out of my father's watchful eyes is a miracle in itself, so getting Harry out of Voldemort's clutches will be a major feat of daring and daredevilry on my part.

When it occurs to me that in reality, I have nothing to lose anymore.

My mind is so far away trying to go through every conceivable plan of escape in my mind that I don't notice until the party, along with the Stunned Harry, arrives at the entrance of the most foreboding dungeon cell of the castle. Voldemort and my father are already inside and with the feeble light through the small barred window near the ceiling of the cell, I can see most satisfied and malicious smiles, obviously ecstatic over the little treat we have for them.

"Ah—very well, Draco. You have brought me a very magnificent gift indeed," the Dark Lord's high-pitched voice resonates the excitement of having captured Harry Potter finally.

"It was nothing, your Lordship," I reply. Screw yourself!

Voldemort raises his wand and points it at Harry. My heart feels like a herd of stampeding bulls—he can't kill Harry…yet. He can't. Harry is Dumbledore's secret-keeper and so Voldemort can't kill him yet without knowing Dumbledore's whereabouts.

"_Enervate!_"

Harry's eyes slowly open and somehow by the look on his face, he knows the kind of hell he wakes up in.

"Voldemort," Harry whispers, barely audible. But the hint of strength and fearlessness in his voice cause my heart to lodge in my throat. Even in the face of certain death, he can still manage to sound so dignified as if he is just there by Voldemort's invitation for tea.

"Potter—you truly amaze me with your blind stupidity," the Dark Lord scoffs. "Where is this boy's wand?" Voldemort's question hangs in the dank dungeon.

Goyle clears his throat and starts, "It's with Dr—"

"I had already destroyed it, My Lord, like you have instructed," I say in the sincerest possible way, but Harry's wand presses heavy and cold against the side of my leg. I know the significance of Harry's wand, which I am sure that at the end of the day, will be the only weapon Harry has to escape.

"Good. Now—Harry—I have one simple question for you: Where is Dumbledore?"

The rest of the younger Death Eaters lean slightly forward to try to catch Harry's answer. They are all eager, I'm sure, to know if Harry will give in so early in the game. But instead, Harry chuckles, "I may be so stupid as to let myself be caught, but not to that extent yet, Voldemort. You can kill me, by all means, but I would never tell you where Professor Dumbledore is."

I almost applaud. Almost.

"I knew you wouldn't say anything, boy…I want all of you to give me your Veritaserum phials, right now—every bottle you have," the Dark Lord commands his minions in the room, not leaving the steely gaze of his captive.

When all the phials were already deposited at Voldemort's feet, the latter kneels down and toys with the different-sized phials with his wand. "It's so easy to squeeze the information out of you. Three drops would have you blabbing your deepest, darkest secrets. But it's too easy; don't you think so, Harry? One more time—and don't try my patience—where is Dumbledore?" Voldemort screams to intimidate the prisoner into telling, but the fire in Harry's eyes is something I remember only too well. Voldemort can take him to the nth recesses of hell, but he will never tell.

"Three words. Go. To. Hell," Harry mouths. And my heart completely blocks my air passage.

The Dark Lord wraps a furious hand over Harry's neck and squeezes tight in blinded fury. My legs starts to shake underneath me—no…no…I haven't formulated a plan yet… No! Harry catches his breath as cold fingers close over tighter and tighter, but he doesn't fight Voldemort; Harry just stands there, gazing into death's eye, unflinching, unwavering—his very idea of a dignified death in the face of the ultimate murderer.

My temples throb. How can I watch? How can I bear to keep my eyes open at the grotesque picture of mercilessness? How will I be able to live with myself? Harry is dying in front of me… Fuck Draco—do something!

"Beg! Beg, you filth! Like your mother begged, like Arthur Weasley begged…Beg!"

The scene slows down in my mind's eye. Every haggard breath that Harry takes and the frozen determination in his slowly dulling green eyes are like thorns in my throat—scream, Draco. Scream for it to stop. Like harsh daggers buried in my heart—do something, Draco. Harry can't die. Harry can't die like you have died!

But the sadistic bastard releases him with bitter laughter. "It is too easy. Too merciful—if I snuff you out like a candle. Too silent. But I don't want silence, at least for your death. I want to hear you beg. I want to hear you scream for mercy—mercy that doesn't exist." Voldemort points his wand at the phials at his feet, "_Incendio!_" Fire spreads and eats the phials; violent crackling of fire against cold crystals fills the eerie silence of the dungeon. "You will eventually tell me where Dumbledore is; after which, you will be begging for me to kill you." Voldemort slaps Harry's face hard. "Keep him here and show him _hospitality _until he cracks. After I'm through with you, boy, you will be screaming Dumbledore's location to my face."

The nearest Death Eater to Harry grabs him roughly and clasps his hands to the rusty shackles on the damp and dripping wall of the dungeon. Red angry finger marks are visible on his neck when Voldemort almost strangled him to death and a gash, with the thinnest line of blood, is on his cheek from where the Dark Lord's ring grazed his face when he was slapped hard. But his eyes—his eyes are still the same hard, fearless eyes—those eyes, which have the power to look through a person.

Voldemort and the rest of the party disperse with small talk of disappointment. It's then that I gather up enough face to meet Harry's eyes again since I Stunned him in that alleyway. His eyes are still the same hard, fearless eyes—and they still have the power to search through me.

I'm sorry, Harry. How can I even begin to make amends with all the pain I had caused you? Because if not for my betrayal, you wouldn't be here; Cho would still be alive; Weasley's father would still be alive and I'd still have you…

I see a flicker of hopelessness and calm resignation to his fate in his green eyes that almost makes my heart break. I want to touch him, if only for a moment, so I can feel alive again…so I can feel human again. I want to tell him not to lose hope. Don't lose hope, Harry…

But I avert my eyes without a word and leave, my feet heavy and my heart heavier. I had already betrayed him; he is already at the mercy of Voldemort; Cho is dead; and so is Arthur Weasley and I will never have him back, ever again. It is only in the constricting privacy of my room, three flights of stairs away from where Harry suffers, that I let a stifled, choking sob escape my lips.

_**-emeraldine-**_


	6. Chapter 6

**Rating:** PG for this part but it's going to get more violent**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes: REVIEW! REVIEW!** Draco's point of view in this chappy. This goes out to **Karenn Joy Calosa.**

SALVATION: CHAPTER SIX

I know what I have gotten myself into. Draco should have killed me back there at the alley but nonetheless, I knew then just as well that it's either I die or I end up here.

The dungeon smells of death and dried, rotted blood of all the countless victims before me who have met their end in the hands of the Dark Lord. I can feel the filth of the past and the inevitable future settling on my dirty body like some contagious disease, but I hold up my head through the curtain of uncertainties to face my captors and show them that I am unafraid. They can break me and torture me to their hearts' content; they can leave me here to rot in my bowels, praying for death; they can mock me—but I will show them that I spit on fear and I belittle death.

I was never a good actor. I was never a good liar. I was never the person who can hide behind false shields of strength and gallantry.

I fear, too.

And right now I am dead scared. They don't have to know that, of course. They can drink their fill on the flowing stream of a beaten man's pride. But I will never yield to what they are probably counting on happening in the end. I will hold on to courage and even the tiniest shred of hope—after all, in the middle of certain death amongst the heartless and the soulless, amidst the agony and the betrayal, the pain and the sadness, they are all that I have. I am still alive, and while I am, I hold my fate.

While there is breath in my body, Voldemort will never succeed. I may be shackled and bolted shut that I can't fight anymore, but I am still the key to the only man Voldemort has ever feared, and while that holds, he can never defeat me; he can never quash the burning hope of the people to rise above his domination.

I keep my head cast down, in deep thought, dreading when my captors will come and try to crack my façade of valor. I don't have to wait long as the dungeon door creaks and three Death Eaters cross the threshold into what's left of my impregnable fortress. The Death Eaters are smug beneath their hoods, partially covering their faces. The purpose of concealment is lost on me, though. In the long run, they're all going to torture me regardless of who they are anyway. I raise my head more to try to look into their eyes, into what are supposedly the windows of their souls. But there is nothing recognizably human there. They are all, technically, hyenas, cornering their prey.

"Good morning, Potter. We have your breakfast."

I know that singsong voice anywhere—Zabini. It's next to useless to try to get out of what's naturally going to come after. "You can kill me right now, but I stand by what I told the biggest bully this side of the playground, I will never tell you where Professor Dumbledore is," I mock.

"We will see." Zabini signals his two other companions to take me off the wall. They remove the shackles and push me to kneel like a wounded animal on the grimy dungeon floor. One of the two Death Eaters takes a handful of my hair and makes me face Zabini, smugly standing before me. "Where is the old man, Potter? And don't make me repeat that question; you will find that I can be just as ruthless as my master," he threatens.

"And just as dumb and deaf. I will go to hell first—and take you with me—but I will never tell you where he is."

Zabini, without further warning, smashes his heavily booted foot against my abdomen. He kicks me hard on my chest, my back and my groin repeatedly before I can say any more. I try raising my hands to shield my body but the two other thugs hold them with sinister laughter as Zabini kicks me in all places that his boot can reach.

Waves upon waves of unbearable pain course through my body. Even without the dreaded Cruciatus curse, the pain can drive anyone mad.

I retch blood on the already grimy floor of the dark, dank dungeon. And cough until the pain is somewhat eased. My lungs fight to burst through my nose. I am spread-eagled, shameless on the dungeon floor, nursing my beaten body. Blood pounds in my temples, flowing out my nose and mouth but I make no move to wipe them off. The pain is like a manacle, binding me to the cold dungeon ground, wasted and spent.

"I'm going to ask you again; where is—"

"Save it, Zabini—if your master couldn't squeeze it out of me, then I will bet all the ends of the world that you won't be able to as well," I gag. I am more than ready and willing to die. I know what I have gotten myself into. Twenty-four hours ago, in the ruins of Hogsmeade, holding Cho's dead body in my arms, I knew that I would die fighting for this cause. And twenty-four hours later in the presence of my torturers, one thing holds true: nothing had changed between then and now.

Zabini roars in anger, his voice reverberating throughout my being, echoing tenfold in the confines of the little cell, where I will feel the last of life's finest: to die fighting, seemingly unafraid and unwavering. A strong force from the tip of Zabini's wand carries me from my stupor and smashes my broken body against the stone wall of the cell. The two other torturers don't let the party stop then. They seize me and continue to smash their rock hard fists on my body that had already been reduced to that of a rag doll's.

The colliding fists cease to matter as I watch myself being beaten to a pulp. I am there, detachedly watching them beat me up like a spectator watching someone else's funeral. There's no more pain, no more suffering. Someone shackles me to the chains on the wall again, but I don't notice anymore. The feeling of drifting away overwhelms me. The feel of my own blood doesn't matter anymore.

"You will learn to know where you stand in this game, Potter. Believe me, that day will come. That day when you will beg for mercy will come and when that happens all of us will pitch in to kill you with the deepest satisfaction," Zabini sneers and spits by my numb feet. The three finally leave with arrogant swishes of their cloaks, leaving me in the boundary between life and death.

My clothes are torn, my body bleeds, my mind screams for the brevity of this suffering, but alas, I am still alive.

Something hot trickles down my stinging cheeks, mingles with my blood and my sweat. I almost dismiss it before I realize that a soft sob of hopelessness has escaped not from another's lips but mine. Just kill me, kill me and get it over with.

My strength can only be so much, and I don't know until when I can hold the façade of strength and stubbornness. My body can only take so much beating. A painful but soft cry escapes my chapped mouth laden with dark wounds and dried blood. The tears continue to fall, its saltiness cutting through and penetrating the deep wounds of battle: a battle with my own resolve with nothing to gain and nothing to lose but the lives of many, a battle with those longing to break me, a battle against the urge for betrayal.

What am I fighting for? Am I fighting for the salvation of the whole Wizarding world or am I fighting for my own salvation?

Just so I can call myself a better man than Malfoy.

Look at yourself Harry, I tell myself, crying like a child, holding back, trying so hard to prove something—but what?

I know I would never succumb to betray the people I care for like Draco did, but is that what this is all about? That I am just here laying my ass on the line so I can show Draco that he was a bastard and I am god? Is that all?

I let the tears fall, not suppressing a single teardrop from being shed. Well, Potter, you can't say you're succeeding, can you?

A creak resonates throughout the cell as the barred door opens again. I am already readying myself for another round of torture, hoping that the tears had already dried along with the blood, so they can't see how truly weak I am when a pair of familiar shoes shine through the feeble light of the dungeon cell.

I raise my head, fighting the pain demons constricting me to see a pair of gray eyes, dull but glassy with unshed tears and unspoken words.

"Harry," Draco begins. I thought the pain of being beaten up near death can never find a greater pain, but clearly I am wrong. The greater pain, far more superior that any method of torture or any spell known to man now stands before me.

"Malfoy."

_**-emeraldine-**_


	7. Chapter 7

**Rating:** PG for this part but it's going to get more violent**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** Before I completely forget, in case you missed the signs, I'd like to tell you that there is character death here. As for which character, you'd have to read on to find out. Draco's perspective this time. **I still need reviews, folks!** For **Trina Florencio.**

SALVATION: CHAPTER SEVEN

"Malfoy."

I try to swallow my apprehensions but they congeal like blood in my throat. I just stand there and look at Harry, debating with myself whether I should try to explain myself or just leave him here. After all, even if I explain, it's not going to change anything—all of my sins and all of Harry's hate for my betrayal will never be undone. But I just stand there anyway, looking at Harry, unspeaking, unmoving, biting back my sobs and explanation that are six months too late, countless deaths behind. Why am I here, anyway? Do I actually believe that Harry would listen to reason while shackled to the grimy dungeon wall, hurting from head to foot, grieving for lives lost, and waiting for his own death that is only a matter of time? Who am I kidding?

"What are you doing here? Coming to gloat, is it?" The words sting so much that I feel like slapping myself for thinking that coming here will do any good.

"I just—" I start, but the words die in my throat again. Being here, looking at the only person who had defied all odds to give me his trust and his friendship albeit the rest of the world has cynicism and mistrust because of my family's personal connections to Voldemort, feels like losing myself and my humanity all over again. What can I say? How can I make amends while I'm not the one with my wrists manacled to the wall, state worse than death, or heart crushed with grieving over deaths I could have prevented? "I'm sorry," is all I say, very meekly, injecting as much of what's left of my humanity and of my self-respect into my words, though knowing full well that had Harry's hands been free, he would have strangled me.

"You actually think it's that easy?" Harry hoarsely says, the fire in his eyes hurting me more than the spite in his voice.

"Nothing is ever easy for both of us, isn't it?" And it's true—nothing is easy; everything either bleeds you dry or bleeds you even drier and leaves you for dead. I can't find my voice once again; all of the events of the past rush to me like never before and open the floodgates that I had kept shut. Hot tears form and fall down my cheeks faster than I can control them. If Harry only knew the kind of life I had to lead since the day I was forced to betray his trust… then what? I should face it that no matter what the dilemma was, no matter how much I suffered for it, I don't deserve to be forgiven.

Harry averts his gaze from me and casts his eyes down with his grimy, tangled black hair hiding his bloodied face. The silence is broken with my soft sobs and the unheard echo of my tears falling from my eyes. Harry need not say anything; I know how much I had hurt him that there is absolutely nothing I can do to atone for my sins. I turn around to leave, half-blinded by my tears, slowly trying to make myself accept that there can be no amends for me when another set of soft sobs join my anguished ones.

I stop dead in my tracks and listen intently. There they are, soft cries that aren't from my lips, like whispers of yesterdays gone and tomorrows lost for me and for the other person in the room simply waiting for death, for the end, for forgiveness that will never come, for explanations that will never be heard. "Why did you do it, Draco?"

Why? I don't know if the statements I rehearsed for the past six months in the back of my mind will even sound half-justified as I stand there, with my back to Harry, crying like a child. Why did I do it?

Because I had no choice? "Nothing is ever easy for both of us," is all that my sobs allow from my mouth. "I had no other alternatives."

That is as nasty as it can get. Of course, there was another alternative: death. Why didn't I take it then instead of betraying Harry? Ah yes, because death was the easy way out…

"So you gave your soul to Voldemort and killed all of those people and betrayed our trust because you had no choice? Draco, do I look like I have a choice right now? And yet you don't see me buckling down to what they want me to do—because, unlike you, I'd die first than betray the trust of the people who matter to me. I thought I mattered to you, Draco, but you let me down; you let us all down," Harry says, no louder than a whisper. And yet the effect on me is as if a dagger is plunged into my heart, over and over, with every accusing word.

You don't understand, Harry. I don't think you will ever get to understand…

"You can tell me anything you want; I know I deserve every word. I know I should've just killed myself then. I tell you, if it was my life versus betraying you all, I'd have chosen to kill myself, but it was not the case. It was not the case…"

I plunge back into the past I thought I had forgotten. My mother, through the paper-thin walls of the dungeon cellars of my own home, my mother screamed—for mercy and in pain as the animals that pass themselves off as humans ravaged her. I screamed for their mercy, begged for them to stop and take my life instead just so my mother could be spared, but Voldemort—he just laughed coldly and dragged me from where I was slumped into the next room, and there I saw them ravaging my mother's frail body while my father laughed, doing nothing to stop the bastards raping his wife. My strength had given out then, I cried like I had never cried before. You were never there, were you, Harry? You never saw them, raping my mother again and again. Yet I still managed to crawl to where my mother was indifferent and unmoving, like a rag doll, softly sobbing as the man on top of her thrust into her almost lifeless body. I killed that man, you know—Harry, I killed him, blindly and in a rush of the greatest fury I had never known. And I was mauled, beaten to a pulp in front of my mother while she cried softly and murmured for mercy that never came. Pain, like a thousand knives into my body, almost left me for dead. But you weren't there, were you, Harry? And when I awoke, they put me under Imperius, but I fought it off, Harry—you taught me how, remember? Voldemort was so angry. My father was so angry that he, himself, held the double-edged dagger to his wife's neck just to make me talk. But my mother told me through fearful eyes that I mustn't betray you or Dumbledore. They were going to kill my mother…

What were my choices, Harry? Were you there when I was nursing my pain and looking my mother dead in the eye, debating with myself whether I should tell them what they wanted to hear? I was going to stand my ground, you know. But they put Cruciatus over my mother. They held my neck in place to see from start to finish the pain that my mother had to suffer. I shut my eyes and cried; I cried; I cried—it was all I could do. And I felt something warm touch my lips, my tongue. It would've been glorious had it been poison, but no—it was something you never taught me to fight, Harry. It was Veritaserum. I answered everything they asked me, and I tried fighting it; I did—but I was so weak and my mother was being ravaged again in front of me, screaming, screaming…

Were you there, Harry? Were you there when I was being mangled? Were you there when my mother was being raped? How about when I was being tortured afterward to keep me from running back to you? Were you there when they caged my mother in our own home to keep me under their control? Were you able to see it whenever they would whip my mother to make me do their bidding? Were you there when both my father and Voldemort would put me under Imperius so I wouldn't be able to fight it off? Were you there to witness me slipping in and out of Imperius control, losing my mind and the last hold on my humanity, on who I used to be?

I wasn't a traitor, Harry. I would've died first than betray you. But you should've known better than think I'd let you down…

"What would you have done when your mother was being ravaged in front of you? What could you have done if two, three people would put you under Imperius at the same time that you didn't know what it feels like to be human anymore? What could you have done if your friends already thought you had betrayed them? What? Tell me."

Silence. Blessed silence. Sobs. Soft sobs that can never take back the past. I didn't have a choice then. I don't have a choice now. But I can't let you suffer as I had suffered. I can't let you wither away as my life has withered away. There is nothing I can do for myself, but I will do something to get you out even if it is the last thing I do, Harry. There is fear in my heart; there is apprehension; there is loss; there is regret. If only I could bring back everything—

I welcome the fear, the apprehension, the loss, the regret. After all, it's been a long time since I was human enough to feel them. In front of Harry, as if I could make-believe that nothing had happened, that we are back in Hogwarts rediscovering each other and becoming friends after six years of overt hostility, I make a silent but solemn vow.

"I will get you out," I whisper. It sounds so final; and in a way, it is. The fear, the apprehension—they're not for me. I fear for Harry and for what's going to happen to him if I fail to get him out. "I had betrayed you once, I won't simply stand around, watch you die and betray you for a second time. You may think I have changed, but no—nothing has changed. I am still the Draco you used to know."

"How can I trust you again?"

"Who else can you trust?

Harry meets my eye and I feel a rush—the same rush I used to feel whenever his eyes met mine. I was Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter's friend. My father was a Death Eater but I was not; my mother was safe and happy at home; Harry trusted me as I trusted him. Everything was back to the way they should be.

Too bad it can't last.

"I have a plan," I plunge on. "I need you to trust me and I need you to keep believing; don't lose hope. I will get you out of here." I look around the dungeon and perk my ears to hear if anyone is close by. But I am met with silence. Harry looks at me, waiting for me to change my mind and keep my blissful safety under Voldemort's cloak as one of his Death Eaters.

"What about your mother? They would know about your plan to get me out. And you're going to put her in danger," Harry mouths, voice hoarse.

"Now you must promise me one thing, Harry. Promise me that once you get out of here, you will get my mother out of our manor and to safety, where my father will never be able to find her. Promise me that you will save her."

Harry is silent but nods once, gently.

I turn to leave, immersed in my thoughts, my heart constricted but a little hopeful. At the very least, Harry already knows what happened that fateful night that I went to see my mother who was in Voldemort's possession and never came back again. He may or may not forgive, but it appeases me that somehow, understanding and forgiveness will come because he has already heard my explanation.

"Draco—" Harry calls, breaking my thoughts. I stop and look at him, who is still shackled to the cell wall, shadowed by the darkness in the feeble light. "What about you? You're going to endanger yourself by helping me. They will kill you once they learn of your betrayal."

I smile, somewhat wistfully. "You're forgetting, Harry. I already died the day I betrayed you."

_**-emeraldine-**_


	8. Chapter 8

**Rating:** R for this part for the violence…**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** Harry's POV again. Violence abound. Reviews a must. Dedicated to **Sandra Maclang.**

SALVATION: CHAPTER EIGHT

I'm so tired. Please, just let me die so I won't experience this kind of pain any longer. Just…just snuff me out and it'll probably be the greatest thing you can do for me at this point. I'm begging you, please. I'd want to make a deal here but, hell, what have I got to exchange for the favor? You've stripped me of absolutely everything else except my dignity; what have I got to give? Nothing.

The cold lash of a whip sears through the flesh of my back but I've already lost the voice to scream; I've lost the tears to cry; I've lost the words to beg for whatever infinite power is there to just end my suffering. The manacles that bind me to the grimy ceiling of the dungeon cell grind my wrists raw. The sharp savor of the blood from my lips fills my mouth, my throat, my whole being as I hang there by my wrists, biting my lower lip to keep me from sobbing. Maniacal laughter erupts from everywhere wrapping my suspended body in echoes of mocking mirth, but I've become deaf just as I've become numb from the pain. Go ahead, laugh—laugh to your heart's content—I don't give a flying fuck. You can break me to pieces but Dumbledore's whereabouts would remain a secret. My secret. The secret within my soul.

"Do you want this, Potter?" A hoarse voice hollers to me, but my eyes are too clouded to see who it is. Red haze keeps me from using the faculties of sight, which is probably better since I have no desire to see myself. How low I've fallen. How my body has ceased to feel remotely like a body of a live human being. How pitiful I have become. A cold draft kisses my aching shell, sending stings of pain from the roots of my hair to the tips of my toes that were two feet above the slippery dungeon floor. "Speak! Where is Dumbledore?" But my pain is somewhat pushed to the periphery by such a strong urge. In spite of the utmost soreness that covers me, I laugh, a loud, bitter, contemptuous laugh that fills the dungeons, bounces off the walls, reverberates through me and through the cold room filled with demons, over and over like melancholy and foreboding ghosts, like whispers, like emptiness…if emptiness could ever have a sound.

Another slash of the whip slices the cold laughter of my delusions short. My laughter turns into the coldest scream of greatest pain as the sharp hooks at the end of the whip dig into my skin, wedge into the very core of my soul that when it is pulled back, a small part of me is taken. Again and again, it cuts through me, taking with it myself, the hopes that Draco wanted me to hold on to. I can never be whole again.

"Beg! Beg for our mercy, bastard!" A series of hollers eerily fill the room to a crescendo, deafening, filling my ears. I can't hear myself over the din of maniacal laughter. I can only hear the faintest cry, the faintest whimper from within me.

I'm never going to get out of here. This is where I'm going to die—by the hands of Voldemort's mercenaries. The hope within me, the secret within me will never help me survive. There is no Ron or Hermione to feed me the grandeur of being the hero that I am to the people of the Wizarding World. There is no Dumbledore to rescue me…no Sirius or Hagrid to boost my morale. I don't even have myself anymore…

The laughter fills every inch of the room that no one hears the muffled sob that finally escapes my lips and silent tears upon my cheeks. Every time they do this to me, I am less and less myself. I am more and more vulnerable. I am weaker. The tears that were never there are more often in my company now, amidst my own personal suffering. I am so tired. So…so tired…

The manacles binding me to the ceiling release me so suddenly that my body crashes to the moist ground of the cell. My back sears with pain when it hits the cold and damp floor. My arms and every surface of my flesh that the whip had burrowed into sting with every attempt at movement. I merely curl up into a heap in the middle of the room, surrounded by hooded Death Eaters—whose deathly poisonous glares burn through my clammy, blood-covered skin. "You should know better than anger the Dark Lord. You will never get out of here alive, Potter. So you might as well say where Dumbledore is and spare yourself further suffering," a tall, cloaked Death Eater ominously says. Cloak swishes, muffled footsteps, whispered threats, and they are gone, leaving me in my solitude to think about the life I am slowly losing and the hope I had already lost.

I'm deathly tired. Please, just end all of this suffering. I don't deserve any of this…

But my prayers are only just that…prayers…made up of empty words of a man hanging off the edge of a cliff by his pinkie. There is no salvation. There is no pardon or second chances. There is only finality. Death. Chances that will never come again.

I spend the long hours crying my tears softly until I feel as if I've dried up. I know they will be coming back soon. Again. To squeeze the information out of me and kill me little by little. Until when? I don't know. Maybe until such time as I beg hard enough for them to finish me off finally. Or until such time as I betray Dumbledore. Which will come first? How will my story end?

Using fire? They already used fire on me once. Before. There were balls of fire on the tip of their wands and they would scorch my abdomen, my shoulders, my neck, every bare flesh they could find until I screamed myself hoarse with the pain, the sting of the fire licked my skin, ate me, burned my soul, smoldered me. I screamed, then. But I never begged.

Using a dagger? Goyle had a lot of fun with that one. He even wrote his whole name on my neck. Cut through me—G—With every intrusion of the blade—R—warm blood escaped—E—spilled over my chest—G—branded me like an animal—O—Seared—R—impaled me with a look of evil satisfaction with every deep cut of the dagger, opened my skin for infestation—Y. I never knew he could spell… Warm blood oozed down my front and soaked my shredded robes. Every spurt of the scarlet liquid took a little of my dignity. But I never begged.

Electrocution perhaps? Wizard electrocution was definitely much worse than electrocution via Muggle appliance. There need not be water to intensify the current coursing through a body. No. I had already known what it would feel like. Nott said it was a clever experiment. Well—I didn't know about the clever part, but it hurt me a lot so it must have worked out well for him. It was a wand; its tip was poked hard against my side. It was a spell. When Nott uttered it, torrents upon torrents of electric current gushed through my body, mutilated me, shook every fiber of my organs. Shredded me from the inside. Burned me up. I never heard myself scream then. But I knew I never begged.

How about cutting off a part of me? Oh Lucius tried that before as well. He stripped my clothes off and with a charm kept my back glued to the dank dungeon wall. With his evil stare, his cold eyes, so unlike Draco's he grabbed my manhood and cut it. I bit my lower lip hard but the tears brimmed in my eyes. He came so close to castrating me. I felt like my humanity was truly and completely lost then. I was no longer a man. It was one of the greatest pains that I thought I would never recover from. I cried like never before, but they never heard me. In my deathlike sleep after that, nursing my wounded groin, Draco came for me and healed me. I never saw him do it, but I knew it was him. I knew. I never ever begged because of him. Because of the hope he gave me.

Cruciatus? I've grown numb to it in endless days and nights of pure torture with two, three Cruciatus spells at the same time. But I never begged. I just accepted their torture in mocking resignation; withholding the one information they were torturing me for. I thought I would lose my mind with the pain. But I never begged.

In all of them, I almost lost my mind with the unbearable suffering but one thing, rather one person, never failed to give back little of what was taken from me. Draco.

The cell door creaks open and I look up, almost spontaneously. Draco locks the barred door behind him and turns to face me, his eyes shining. He would always cry before, whenever he saw me drenched in my own blood, covered with wounds from head to foot. He would always heal me but not to the point of raising suspicion that he was helping me. He would always heal me enough for me to feel remotely human again. Tonight is no different as tears cascade down his fair cheeks again when he sees the heap that is what's left of my mangled body.

"Harry," he murmurs. He kneels down beside me and cradles my head on his lap.

"I don't know how I will be able to heal you completely from everything they've done to you. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry that all I can do is wait and help you in such a small way. When I know it is I who is to blame for your suffering."

Don't cry, Draco. Don't blame yourself. You may feel that you're the one to blame for all this. But for me, you're the one reason that keeps me strong in spite of everything.

I shush him, so softly that he leans closer to me.

I don't know what happened. I don't know what got into me. But the torrents of emotions I have been holding back from all those times I had been tortured rage through me so powerfully that tears, tears I thought had dried up, spill from my eyes and the noisy sobs I had never let my torturers hear fly from my lips. I hold on to Draco like a buoy, my only buoy to keep me alive in the ocean of unbearable anguish. Hot tears spill on to the grimy floor that is one of the few witnesses to Draco's unrelenting presence to keep me hoping, to keep me fighting. Draco bites his lower lip but the tears from his anguished gray eyes spill and touch my cheeks, like dewdrops kissing the dead foliage of the winter that had gone on the eve of spring. And with it, I am alive again.

"I don't remember seeing you cry before," I murmur through my dry and aching throat. I reach up to ghost a finger over Draco's feather-like eye lashes that are moist with tears.

"That's because I never did. Never--in front of you," he replies, averting his shining gray eyes.

"Stay with me, please," I mumble. I am afraid. Deathly afraid, but somehow with Draco there, with my head on his lap, I can forget the throes of death waiting for me around the bend. I keep my arms wrapped around his. His other cradles the back of my head, sending stings to the gaping wounds of the whip. I can still hear its swooshes in the silence of the dungeon, mixing with my sobs and Draco's.

"I'm not going anywhere."

I had found my lighthouse in the middle of the merciless ocean to give me hope anew. Hope I had lost and found again.

_**-emeraldine-**_


	9. Chapter 9

**Rating:** PG for this part.**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** I am a sadist. I know. But hey, I wrote this a long time ago. And like you, I'm a bit surprised I even came up with this. Harry's hardship is actually just beginning. Review please. This chappy is for **Cheska Sayson**.

SALVATION: CHAPTER NINE

I hold the sealed letter in my hand like a lifeline. And in a way, it _is_ a lifeline…Harry's lifeline. He had asked me to bring it to him before I send it and he sealed it with something he said that only Hermione Granger knew how to break—so that Hermione would know that it was from him. I hold on to it tightly in my fist and close to me beneath the folds of my robes, hoping against hope that my absence to send this letter won't be noticed as we destroy a wizarding settlement anew.

"They probably have no idea that Voldemort has me in his possession," Harry had said. This letter would be a way to let the Resistance know that Harry is in serious danger. I am his only hope of ever letting the forces of good know of his whereabouts. But I never told him of my misgivings. I never had the gall to break the tiny bubble of salvation that was the only thing holding Harry together. Right now, as I hold the letter in my slightly sweating hand, I really don't give a damn if Hermione and Ron don't believe in whatever Harry might have said in my defense. But I hope they'd do something to save Harry, fast.

Smoke rises like an eerie cloud over the otherwise clear horizon of Bristol. The great army of Voldemort is at work again, doing their routine of disemboweling people and wiping out settlements from the map. I clutch the folded parchment and whisper a silent prayer. I hope no one would notice I had gone from the festivities of mutilating human beings. I only have nothing longer than a heartbeat to send it out. The Owl Post office is already in shambles. The pillars are nearly reduced to powder save three or four that remain standing to keep the whole caboodle of bricks and rubbish from crushing what is left of the once fine building. Owls are dead at my feet while a handful others are zooming around finding the nearest crack out of the collapsing building. Mangled people who lay dead beneath the stone ceiling of the post office are scattered all over the place, making it hard for my feet to find vacant ground. I take the letter out of my pocket and look up to find one owl among the surviving ones who are madly slipping through cracks. Dust showers from the ceiling along with larger pieces of stone; screeching and howling sounds permeate through my being and resound all over the dilapidated structure. The ceiling will give any second…

I take out my wand from my other pocket and aim it at an owl desperately trying to leave through a broken glass window, but the piece of wood in my hand starts shaking violently in my grasp. Shit—they are summoning me already, but I ignore it. I point the tip at an owl and summon the bird to me. The wand shakes even more violently when I begin tying the note to the owl's foot.

"Take this to Hermione Granger or Ronald Weasley. Probably in the Munich temporary wizarding settlement," I mouth. The ground shakes at my feet and more dust shower from above. A thundering crash breaks the relative silence. The roof is starting to cave in at some part of the building! "Go!" I drop some Sickles in the pouch tied to the bird's leg and release it. I momentarily watch the bird soar out of a larger crack on the stone ceiling with unrecognizable inscriptions that, I know, once had meaning and value, which future generations will never know now. I turn on my heels to run as fast as I can through the uneven ground, strewn with dead bodies and large, pieces of rock jutting out from the ground like overgrown thorns. The roof screams in protest as little bits of it rain down around me. My hand trembles; the wand is still tightly clutched in my palm. A huge boulder crashes some yards before me and shatters to a thousand pieces. Shielding my eyes from the flimsy dust and ash, I turn to look for another exit but the whole building is tumbling down everywhere.

The panic rises like bile in the pit of my stomach. The rest of my fellows might be looking for me already and I'll shoot myself first before they find me in this building… A roaring noise fills my ears as the remaining pillars of the grand edifice give in as if in slow motion. I squeeze myself through a huge crack on the wall and pull the other half of my body in grunts of protest out of the ruins. Too close…

I hopelessly dust myself off and try calming my thundering heart, but I start walking without a sense of urgency, looking for my companions. Please, please, let them be busy maiming some poor creature enough to miss my absence. The thundering of my heart sounds in my ears when I see Crabbe emerging from an apparently empty store and carrying some of what appears to be pillage from various stores of the town. I cross my fingers within my robes' pocket; please let Crabbe be thick enough to overlook it.

"Look what I've got," Crabbe boasts the loot on his large, beefy arms. "Must be worth five hundred Galleons!"

I keep the hard façade, still guarding myself from showing relief that he didn't notice that I had given them the slip. "So you're going to resort to robbing stores as well?" Thank god, I had the presence of mind to do a cleaning charm to get rid of the evidence that I had been running around.

Crabbe snorts and tries stuffing the stolen goods in his pockets. "We can't let _all_ these treasures go to the dogs," he reasons, taking out a pack of crumpets from his pocket and tearing the package open.

I tear my gaze away from my companion and look at the mess that we are leaving behind. Bristol is empty with a strong stench of death amidst the opaque clouds of smoke from the burning buildings. It's a good thing that you're not here to see all this, Harry—to see such loss and desolation—to see deaths that you can't have prevented even if you want to. A cold draft shakes not only the tendrils of my hair but also the deepest of my bones. I hang my head low, whisper yet another silent prayer. Please—don't let it be too late…

"Well—our job's done here, Draco. Let's go," Crabbe urges me out of my reverie. I turn my back towards the ruin of Bristol, taking out my wand and preparing to Disapparate. The image of the sealed letter and the disoriented owl that would be taking it to Granger fill my head that I can't remember taking the trek from the point of Disapparition in the woods to the Unplottable castle where Harry is still being held captive. The sealed letter is all we can do given Harry's situation and the hawk eyes glued to my every move. But what's going to happen next if Granger disregards that letter? What will Harry have to go by if that move fails?

I enter the cold doors of the castle and keep walking briskly to nowhere; every inch of my mind is occupied with one horrible thought after another. I meet up with other young Death Eaters mingling in the halls but I greet none of them. I am not up to my usual role-playing of kissing up to their asses.

"Draco!" I stop in mid-stride, dreading the voice that I know I can't ignore.

"Yes, father?" I keep my back to him, keeping my anger in check as is usual whenever I'm faced with this loathsome excuse for a father. My back tenses and my jaw hardens. All those days when I'd always find Harry in a messy heap, mumbling incoherently with pain come back to me, and the anger rises in my chest.

"Crabbe told me you did Bristol today."

"Yes." Harry was crying in his sleep, nursing a bloodied groin that I have every faith my father caused. He was asleep but awake with the boiling pain he must have felt. I listened to his cries, shared his pain and healed however I could. Harry clutched my hand so tightly then, never wanted to let go—bit his lip in pain until he shed blood. When he awoke the next day after that ordeal, the pain burned in his dulled green eyes—there was pain; and there was fear.

"He also told me he lost you somewhere. That you were gone for some time and couldn't be contacted."

Shit. I knew Crabbe was a snitch. I shouldn't have let my guard down and believed I was already out of suspicion.

"Where were you, Draco?" That hard, cold voice that I had always feared issues from behind me.

You sodding bastard… I turn my head and the corner of my eye sees his imposing cloak and nothing more. "You don't trust me, father?" Answer me! Answer me! How can you not trust me, when you once controlled everything I am, stolen everything I had and hurt everyone I love yet you never heard a fucking word from me?

"I do trust you. Just don't ruin that _trust_."

You have a very twisted definition of the term trust, Lucius Malfoy. The _trust _you know of means you have me clutched in your nasty little hand by my balls. "Exactly how am I going to do that, father, when you have employed everyone with eyes to watch me like a hawk?"

"You know what's at stake if you try to help Potter."

"Why should I help him when I'm the one who brought him to you in the first place?"

"Just watch where your loyalties lie because I have her to keep you in check," he ominously says. I turn around abruptly. My mother—he is still going to use my mother to control me.

"Don't…hurt her…again," I whisper loud enough to make his eyes narrow.

"Don't let me put Imperius on you again, Draco. We know you won't like that."

"Well—we both know you have other, much better tactics, at controlling people…father." I practically spit the last word out as bitterly as is humanly possible and start walking away.

"I have every power to kill her, you know that. It's Potter or your mother, who would you choose?" A final threat is called to my attention. And angry tears form in the corners of my eyes. It will inevitably boil down to that. I will have to choose. Harry promised me he'd take my mother out of danger, but how much of his promise would matter while he was being tortured day in and day out?

I made a choice once between Harry and my mother that both she and I ended up regretting for the rest of our lives, knowing that we would forever be slaves to evil that we never wanted to be a part of.

And Harry.

Harry has every right to be set free. And right now only I have the power to help him.

I walk into my room and bang the door shut. The tears escape from my eyes even before I reach my table to bury my face in my hands. One day, my father will pay dearly for everything. He will pay through the nose, if I have something to do about it.

Oh yes, father, I have to choose. If it is between a life like this or the most painful death imaginable…

I'd pick death. Time and time again.

_**-emeraldine-**_


	10. Chapter 10

**Rating:** R for violence.**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** Some of you think that Harry can't get any lower than this and I should stop the sadism, but please indulge me. Consider ever lash of the whip as essential to the story... And every hardship is indeed important. After all, when it rains, it pours, right? This chappy goes out to my dearest sister, **Joy Pagdilao**.

SALVATION: CHAPTER TEN

He comes to me in silence. Like he always does. After the interminable torture day in and day out, he is always there to talk to me and heal my broken spirit. In the darkness of hovering death, he is my candle. And he fights the roughest winds to keep burning for me.

The whip stings my back. But I bite my lip to prevent cries of pain. It's a good thing my eyes are turned to the grimy walls instead of to my attackers. I won't be able to handle it if I see my candle of hope holding the whip stinging the life out of me. I know Draco doesn't want to do it. I can feel the hesitation with every contact of the lashing whip against my skin. He battles the guilt with every flog, every kiss of thin, coarse leather against my skin. Tears form in the corners of my eyes. Both of us are suffering. My suffering is because I know he is suffering. He doesn't want to hurt me, but choice isn't exactly a privilege for the two of us.

Goyle starts to laugh. He had wanted to do the whipping himself, but Draco insisted. It's an act, an act that we have to keep up to protect each other. But it feels so real; every lash of the whip of infernal suffering is so real. And it is Draco doing it. Somehow it had never hurt more than now. I can handle Lucius; I can handle Goyle—hell, even Voldemort, himself. But Draco? It's not so much the carnal pain, but the pain coursing through my being that we have to do this—act like puppets with our own roles to play just to keep the cruel puppeteer happy and clueless. It's starting to become a scene out of a surreal play where every act is done through necessity—called for and well rehearsed. But though the actors know how the play is to unfold, somehow they can't help but keep wishing that things can be different, that the script can be dropped in the middle of the greatest performance and just play hooky—watch how the story weaves itself without the cruel twists of a pre-arranged plot.

I want him to drop the whip. And stop playing the part. I want to just turn around to face him and say something out of my heart instead of keeping to the script.

But the graze of the coarse leather through my back brings me back to the cold, hard reality. That we are here to play the part, no matter how much we desire a different plot—a different ending. Tears cascade down my bruised cheeks, the pain searing from the whip is nothing compared to the pain in my heart because this is how things are always going to be, and I can't change it. This is my fate and this is Draco's.

There is silence and emptiness, hoarse breathing, sneering and whimpering. Is it over? "Keep hitting him, Draco! I can feel that he's about to break. If you don't want to, give me the whip; I'll do it," Goyle protests.

"No. We've done enough," a soft voice mutters from somewhere behind me. There is a faint thud of what seems to be the whip dropping to meet the moss-covered dungeon floor.

"But Draco—"

"Go to my father. I believe he needs a word with you. I'll be right behind you."

"Might as well go with your partner, Malfoy. Because you won't get anything from staying behind," I spit, half-hoping that Goyle will get a clue.

"Go," Draco sternly commands. Feet scratch against the stone floor, hesitant and doubtful. The cell bolt is yanked open with a loud clang. After Draco closes the cell door behind Goyle, he silently walks towards the wall where my forehead is propped. He plops down on the space beside me, leans his back heavily on the grime-covered wall to my left and bursts into tears without preamble.

I look at him out of the corner of my eye that is not bruised shut. I can barely see him in the dimness and the blur, but I need not see him to feel his pain. Draco's noisy sobs echo through the room, filling every available space of my prison and of my heart. I can't hold back my tears any longer. I join his soft weeping, my undamaged eye shut. "I'm sorry, Harry. I'm so, so sorry," he whispers as if to the wind. "I didn't want to do it. But I had no—"

"Sshh, you don't have to apologize. I already know. We couldn't help the circumstances. We have roles to portray and people to protect. I understand. You can keep hitting and hitting me, you know. It will still be nothing compared to the pain I know you must be feeling to do something you don't want to do. You don't want to hurt me, do you?"

"I don't. You know I don't."

"And by saying that, you've healed me already," I murmur.

"But healing you is not enough. Soon, Voldemort will grow tired of hurting you. He will kill you, and I don't know how to protect you from that," Draco half-whispers, his voice lost in the feral dimness of my prison. I bite my lip, swallowing the nasty laugh, boiling in my being. No one can protect me from my inevitable end. My mother just bought me nineteen years of borrowed time but still, this is where—this is how—I will face my end. Somehow, in the many weeks that I have witnessed the life ebbing out of me, I have come to accept it. In the end, Draco's efforts would all be in vain. And holding on to the finest thread of life—for as long as I have—would be worth nothing.

Hot tears are on my cheeks, kissing every wound that had been made and healed on my face, washing away what's left of the dying embers of my hope. "I'm tired, Draco. I'm so tired. I don't know until when I can last."

Draco stands up and unshackles my hands from the dungeon walls. Slowly, with shaking members, I face him. "I just want all this to stop. If Voldemort kills me today, I would welcome it—it's something I've always wanted in place of this interminable suffering," I mumble. I look up to meet his eyes; my other eye is swollen shut while the other appraises the sobbing young man in front of me, and tears continue to leak from it as well as from the other eye. My knees are weak with the torture. I just want to give up and beg at the top of my lungs for Voldemort to end it all for me.

Draco clutches my wrists between his body and mine and squeezes, so hard that I wince in pain. His hands are slick with grime and dried blood from my skin, but he clutches my wrists still, unfazed, and looks deep into my one eye where he can probably see what's left of my soul, of the old Harry he used to know. "You're giving up on me?" More unshed tears pool in my eyes, the one he can look through and the one hiding the greater feeling of fear. His face melts in my vision, blurs in my mind, distorted and foggy.

"It's better this way. That we both know how things are going to end. This should be the last you ever go here and risk talking to me. For all we know, it could all be over tomorrow and it's better if they don't drag your name in. You have your mother to protect and this is my life to give up." It makes little sense. But what is crystal clear is that I'm giving up—Draco should stop trying to help me because all the hope in the world probably won't be able to.

"I'm sorry I ever doubted you—that I thought you had betrayed me. But it has to stop sometime, Draco. You can't help me; you can't protect me, _no one can._ Ever since I was born, I have been prophesied to suffer and die in Voldemort's hands, and all the hope available in the world cannot change that fate," I choke. "I'm so, so tired."

Draco bursts into noisy tears in earnest and throws his arms around my neck to hold me close. I throw my hands around his shoulders as well. His heart is beating ever so faintly against my bare and grime-blackened chest, and hot liquid is pelting on the shoulder where his chin is softly propped. He is crying as well, pouring the indescribable suffering that must be eating him just as my own personal pain is eating me.

If this is the last contact I will ever have with a human being who cares about me, I am glad it's Draco—my source of hope that kept me fighting for as long as I have.

"You're _my_ hope. I get more hope from you than you from me, Harry. Do you know that? It's the fact that you keep on fighting that makes me get through my own wretched existence. Without you, I'm as good as dead. I can't let you lose hope. I can't! Just—just hang in there. For me, Harry, please. Don't give up. The Resistance will come for you. They have resisted Voldemort's attacks recently and got themselves some senior Death Eaters as hostages to get to you, to where you're hidden. Don't lose hope, please. If I have to stay here with you every night from now until you get rescued to keep the flame of hope burning in you, I will. I don't care if my father suspects me. I don't care if Voldemort kills me—I'm always going to be here for you. I'd lay down my life in exchange for yours if I have to. Because you mean more to me than you know, Harry. I lo—"

I embrace him more fiercely, cutting him off. What would I have become without you, Draco? How could I have survived for as long as I have without you?

Warm hands travel down my spine, caressing my back marred with crisscrossing wounds of tortures past. Just the touch of his finger is enough to heal me, to remind me that loss of hope had never stopped me before, and so it shouldn't now. Just the touch of his chin on my shoulder is more than enough for me to hang in here, fighting for my life and for the lives of many others I am yet to avenge.

Draco breaks free from the embrace but presses close to me, and kisses the lightning bolt-shaped scar on my forehead, almost obscured by new and deeper wounds since my imprisonment. His breath is comfortably hot on my forehead, and his hands are tightly clasped around my forearms. It feels so rejuvenating as if he is breathing new life into me, as if he is sharing what's left of his own life with me.

I start to make a vow: I'm not going to let Draco down. The feeble light of strength from the core of my soul again defeats my momentary loss of hope.

He murmurs something I don't quite catch but I don't ask him to repeat it. The treble of his voice already speaks volumes anyway.

His lips touch my closed and swollen eye, and I close my other eye as if by instinct. Just your touch, Draco. Just your touch—and I am alive again, fighting like I've never fought before.

"They're coming for you. I can feel it. The capture of the three senior Death Eaters that my father and Voldemort were discussing heatedly last night is the start of it. What I should do now is to keep you alive, long enough for them to find you. And what you should do is wait and trust me."

I can feel that he doesn't want to leave me, but he extricates himself from touching me and walks slowly to the bolted door, careful to hide his eyes brimming with mixed emotions. We might be kidding ourselves, of course. It is also possible that the Resistance never believed the letter Draco sent before that told them that I was Voldemort's prisoner, and the capture of the senior Death Eaters was just a coincidence, but I shun it away. "Draco?"

He freezes and hastily wipes his face before facing me again with a radiant smile given that his cheeks are lined with tearstains. "Shouldn't you tie me up?" His eyes soften and he walks back to me, weakly leaning on the mossy dungeon wall, painted with dried blood

Waving his wand, he refastens my wrists to the rusty manacles on the wall. His sad eyes are full of fear but also burn with unanswered prayers that somehow, everything will right themselves in the end.

"I'll be back later and—" There is something else he wants to tell me, but he hesitates. There is raw emotion in his eyes that is unfathomable, inscrutable. The hesitation makes my faint heart beat a little faster. The pain in every inch of my battered body is momentarily forgotten as I stand there, drinking in the emotions I can't quite understand in Draco's hesitant voice, in his tone that is holding something back. Draco just tilts my chin to look into my only open eye, bites his lower lip hard, probably stifling more tears and says something that would never, ever be erased from my mind probably until the day I die.

"—And always remember, if it boils down to a choice between your life and mine, I'll give my life for you. That's how much you mean to me, Harry. You mean more to me than you can imagine—in this life and in the next."

And so will I, Draco. So will I.

_**-emeraldine-**_


	11. Chapter 11

**Rating:** PG for this part...**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** I'm reminding everyone that this is, first and foremost, a love story. This is for **Donna Cruz**.

SALVATION: CHAPTER ELEVEN

I love him.

It hit me like a ton of bricks and a pail full of ice-cold water. But then it's something I had always known. When he expressed his trust during seventh year in spite of the dissuasion of his friends because of my connections with Voldemort, I had already known it because it was he who brought me back my life by trusting me when no one would. It was he who showed me the other side of life, that I could be someone people never trusted me to be, that I could be capable of caring for another human being, that I could be different from my father and could be saved from the filth of my name. It was Harry. It was Harry who gave me a new reason to live and a new path to take. By offering his hand in friendship after seven long years of overt animosity, he never really knew how much it had changed me, how much it had completed me.

Long ago, has it been that long? Harry would look at me with those encouraging green eyes, so trusting, so innocent, and I would know that I had made the right choice. I miss the fire in those eyes because it had fizzled out in the eyes of the man, shackled to the cell wall. It _has_ been a long time. So long that I had somehow forgotten how his eyes used to look like.

I long to see them burning again. They may not burn for me, but I long to see them burn anyway to remember the first time it had dawned on me that I was in love with him.

It is still Harry who makes life bearable. It is Harry who makes each cursed day a blessing. I wish I had told him what I feel. I shake my head, erasing a burgeoning hope that Harry will actually appreciate what I feel. He loved Cho. In the kind of way Harry will never love me. It was painful how I kept it, burning my throat. But what was I hoping for? What can I expect from a person fighting the life-threatening tortures three times a day, almost to the point of death, when I tell him that I'm in love with him? It's not like Harry will shiver in delight and start planning a vacation for two in the Bahamas.

But the realization actually gives me more reason to do everything I can to save Harry from Voldemort and sure death. I had wanted to protect him then, and I want to protect him now. I would risk everything for the one I love. I will give up everything for Harry just like I know, I believe, he will give up everything for the one _he_ loves. It is not me—but I don't give a shit. I don't need him to love me back to keep my heart beating. It will beat, and beat—probably until the very last—for Harry whether or not his heart would find the reason to beat for me.

There is no time to waste. Voldemort might get the killing urge any moment when he starts feeling cornered with the capture of Nott, Avery and Rookwood, and Harry should be saved before Voldemort gets ideas.

I swipe a low-hanging tree branch and squint through the thick trees of the forest. The ground is hard and slippery, and traversing through it is made more difficult by the darkness shrouding the area. By day, the forest is nowhere near as scary and dangerous as the Forbidden Forest of Hogwarts especially since this is what we have to get through every time we Apparate to another magical settlement to destroy and Disapparate back to the castle, which has served as our hideout since the Riddle house, where the Death Eaters used to stay, had been attacked at the start of the war. But the moonless night cradles the forest and makes it three times scarier than the one at Hogwarts.

I trip on a protruding tree stump and almost fall on my face with a yelp, but I recover myself quickly. No one should get wind of my rendezvous tonight. No one should get suspicious of my business in the heart of this forest, because if my calculations are correct, Resistance fighters are in the area, fishing for the castle where Harry is kept as disclosed by the captured Death Eaters. If my hunch is right, Hermione and the rest of the gang are in the heart of the dark forest, breaking through very dangerous Wards and Concealment curses set by the dark wizards as inconspicuously as possible to maximize the element of surprise, to get to Harry. Something pricks on the crook between my lower arm and my forearm, behind my elbow and I wince. Voldemort is getting worried and is particularly vindictive tonight. And it would also mean that Harry is being tortured again to disclose the whereabouts of Dumbledore. He would be able to stall long enough to make this rendezvous undetected.

A far-off owl hoots and I look up, keeping my eyes and ears open for any signal that I was being watched. The treetops are so thick that not even a solitary twinkling star can be seen. The ground is uncomfortably uneven and scattered with twigs and rocks that crunch against my feet that might give my night-time stroll away. I stop to listen for footsteps or any audible sign of someone retracing my path, but there is nothing but the hum of the secretive woods. Misty gray breaks through the thick covering trees and I freeze, expecting a whole horde of Death Eaters demanding for an explanation for an unauthorized scour of the woods but it is just fog and the tiniest hints of star slivers that escape the tangle of wild foliage.

They have to be here. Nott, Avery and Rookwood would have betrayed our location to the Resistance fighters by now. A lone bat breaks into flight somewhere from my left and I hold out my wand in alarm. The trees are getting thicker and it would be harder for me to return to the castle with almost zero visibility and without any distinguishing landmarks to guide me back in the inky blackness of the evening. Come on, Hermione; where are you guys?

The cold night envelops the exposed skin on my collar and I shiver, not because of the cold but because of fear of what I left behind to try to find Harry's salvation in darkness. Harry is probably being tortured right now, and I can't do anything else but scour the dark forest for any sign of allies. The harsh beating of my heart causes small beads of sweat to form on my forehead. What if I find Harry dead when I come back? What is there left to save? What will happen to me? What will I do?

A sparrow squawks and I look up from the black, rock-strewn earth to search for it. It sounds like a person screaming in pain.

I will die if anything happens to Harry. If I don't die with the grief, I'd definitely kill myself. Because in this ocean of suffering, Harry is my only salvation and without him, there is nothing left to fight for. To live each wretched day for. Just the thought of losing Harry without doing anything takes the breath out of me, choking me. No…Harry will not die. He will avenge all whose lives had been lost to Voldemort's cause. And the first step to guarantee that survival is being undertaken, under the upturned noses of the Death Eaters.

If my father finds out, he'll curse the living daylights out of me, but that ceases to matter anymore. I am already dead, anyway. And so is my mother. We have been killed long ago and raised from the dead to follow a monster in his spread of evil. Our graves have been dug long ago. And it's definitely better this way—I don't have to be afraid anymore—than be afraid for the life I had long since lost

A twig snaps not very far behind me, and I freeze for the second time, holding my wand out. Someone is following me. I close my eyes and pray that it is not one of the Death Eaters. I may have to kill the bastard and that'll take a lot of covering up for the death and Harry might be put in even more danger. Please, don't let it be a Death Eater. Please.

There is a soft rustle of leaves and shrubbery, and a fox emerges behind a gnarled tree trunk that had fallen on the steeper path beside the one I just walked through. Its eyes are translucent yellow in the dead darkness of the forest, watching and waiting. The fox raises its head and bays, sending tremors through my arms pimpled with goose bumps. I close my mouth and start breathing through my nose, my eyes still tightly shut, waiting for the fox to pass. I don't want to use magic to kill it because it will be detected, for sure. The whole castle and the grounds are stuffed full of surveillance charms. Voldemort trusts his own followers less than he trusts his enemies.

Harry's cell is the only unprotected area in the whole castle and its grounds due to the frequent use of magic to torture him, which is why it is only there that I can get away with healing little of Harry every time he is tortured. It is to our advantage that while Voldemort doesn't trust his followers in most aspects, he trusts his minions sent from hell in spreading discord and causing pain on another human being. But in these woods and in the huge, abandoned castle, we are all prisoners, but trapped in a different way. In a more perilous way. That even the master that's being served is an enemy, standing between you and continued subsistence.

I lean close to a tree trunk, to escape the eyes of the fox. My heel scrapes through the slippery moss at the base of the tree in effort to blend myself with the trunk, almost lodging my back in the crevasse of the wood, fervently praying for the fox to miss my presence there. I slip a little and take a sharp intake of breath—huge mistake. The fox's eyes narrow into slits; it looks around for his prey for the night and growls menacingly.

Shit.

I am going to have to fight it.

I slowly emerge from the protective shadow of the tree and raise my wand. I don't want to do this, you stupid animal. But you cross the wrong person tonight.

"_Refra—_"

"Malfoy?" Hermione emerges from the shrubbery where the fox had come from, looking disoriented, badly scratched but flabbergasted at the sight of me in the forest. "Ernie, wait." The fox's mad growls stop. She walks closer to where I am, eyes narrowed to see with the little light from her wand. The fox had gone and in its place is a wizard, whose eyes are narrowed and translucent brown in the darkness, glowing menacingly like the fox's.

"What are you doing here?" The wizard, who is clearly an Animagus, holds out a hand to seize Hermione's wrists before she is close enough to me. "Granger, he's the traitor. We should just kill him," he says, in a growl like the fox that, for a while, I believed, was going to eat me.

"N—no, Ernie," she begins, her face exhausted and clearly distressed. She then turns to me, "You—you sent that letter, didn't you Draco?"

I look at her, scrutinizing her mousy brown hair, displaying a wild array of leaves and small twigs. I narrow my eyes. It might be a trap. Two Death Eaters going fishing, trying to catch me off guard into confessing that it was I, who had been helping Harry all along. It is dangerous—six months in one's worst idea of hell taught me to be vigilant and to trust little. "What were the nicknames I used to call you at school?"

It's lame. "What?" Hermione is even more shocked at what she thought she heard me say.

"Answer me!" I have to be sure.

"Long-molared Mudblood, Buck-toothed know-it-all, smart aleck Mudblood bitch—among many other, more colorful and more degrading names, which one were you waiting to hear?"

I smile. It _is_ Hermione. "Harry's in danger," I welcome her.

She casts her eyes down and tries to pry twigs out of her unruly hair. "We're being stalled. We can't get anywhere near the castle. There's a curse of a dark nature stopping us from getting ten meters closer to the castle. We just lost an Auror this afternoon who attempted to get through the barrier; his flesh dematerialized, and we were left with his skeleton. It's stopping us from getting through. We're not sure how long it will take us to counter it," she briefs me.

"Thank you," I mouth. And it is such a relief to find them here, working feverishly to get to Harry. "Thank you for believing in me."

"Ron screamed himself hoarse trying to discourage me from taking your word for it that Harry has been captured. And he almost had me convinced that we would get absolutely nothing if we believe you. But Harry's encrypted message changed everything. I told him to make a code that only I can break if he's in distress and in need of our help, and sure enough the code was there. Do you know what he said in the encryption?"

I drop down on a protruding root, breathing deeply, thankful that it's almost over. "What?"

"That you are his hope. You never would have betrayed us if your mother wasn't being held hostage in your home. We got to work then, enlisting the help of as many people as we could to storm the castle and rescue Harry…and you. We sent envoys to Malfoy Manor to issue a simultaneous attack to rescue your mother upon Harry's request," she exclaims. And I want to start crying in relief. It might all be over tomorrow.

"We don't have much time. Voldemort is getting agitated over the capture of Nott, Avery and Rookwood. Harry is being tortured right now, as we speak. And Voldemort will kill him without a shadow of a doubt. Voldemort must already know you're on the move. We can't waste any more time. Harry will probably be dead before daybreak." It's not a bluff. If Voldemort feels cornered enough at the betrayal of his three Death Eaters, he will kill the knight standing in his way to checkmate—that knight would be Harry.

"He knows the prophecy and will not hesitate to snuff the life out of Harry, and with the way they have tortured Harry already, he'd probably beg for Voldemort to kill him. The castle has to be stormed by daybreak. Or else…" I trail, refusing to finish the statement and declare the worst-case scenario. That all the Resistance will be able to save is Harry's remnants wrapped in cheesecloth.

"I'm thinking, I'm thinking," she mutters. She turns to the wizard who is still silently standing behind her, listening to every word that has come out of our mouths and asks, "how long will it be before they get around the barrier?"

"At this rate, three days at the quickest."

"We don't _have_ three days!" I hiss, ready to tear my hair out in frustration. Harry's saving grace is within thirty meters of the castle, hindered and helpless, sitting like ducks while Harry is being dismembered, disemboweled and mutilated to the seventy-sixth dimension of infernal hell. This is _not_ happening! I can feel the cold fingers of deep-seated fear squeezing my faintly beating heart.

"Harry would be dead by then. There has to be something we can do to speed things up," Hermione mumbles, shelling out huge efforts to control the blossoming panic in her own system. "How many wizards are working on it?"

"Seven," the Animagus replies, starting to sound a bit agitated himself.

"We have to double the number. And increase the efforts."

"Hermione—" She looks at me, unshed tears in her eyes, eyes that already mirror what can happen if Harry is not freed in time. "Harry is dying in there. And he can't die. He just can't!"

She starts mumbling under her breath. I can almost hear her brain firing one possible solution after another. "Sundown, tomorrow. I will exhaust everything I know just to counter it. I will work on it without food and sleep if I have to, but for your part, you have to keep Harry alive until then," Hermione swears. "Keep Harry alive and I will have you both out of there, and your mother, too by sundown tomorrow. Do I have your word, Draco?"

I look at her determined but mildly panicked brown eyes and nod. You don't have to tell me twice, Hermione.

I turn my gaze to the unseen inky black sky, hoping to get a glimpse of a solitary star, and cough tensely, "I have to be going back now or else they'll notice my absence. I will do everything I can to keep Harry alive until tomorrow then. We will be praying for you."

I turn to go back through the way I came when Hermione calls me again, "Draco!" I stop in my tracks, expecting for her to demand more guarantee from me. "Thank you… for giving Harry back his hope."

"He never lost it, Hermione."

"Well—he once thought he had. But he found it again."

Somehow, I know what she is talking about. "Do take care of him," she mouths, a sob threatening to escape from her lips.

"I will do more than that. I will lay down my life for him." There is no greater love than for a person to lay down his life for the one he loves. "At sundown tomorrow, it'll all be over."

_**-emeraldine-**_


	12. Chapter 12

**Rating:** PG for this part but it's going to get more violent**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** After this, only 2 more chapters remain. I crave reviews!!! I know I'm not the best writer in the first person-present perspective, but I thought I'd dabble in it. Dedicated to **Karen Valeroso**.

SALVATION: CHAPTER TWELVE

Cold draft. But my cell is still, humid and hot. The cold is just probably in my bones, probably just in my imagination, in anticipation.

Draco went back to me last night to talk to me and offer his companionship in merciful but grueling silence and he left at the first sign of dawn, reassuring me that everything was almost over. I wanted to believe him. I _want_ to believe him, but the prickling pain in my eyes, on my skin, gushing through my blood begin to assert themselves anew, more powerful than ever that while it might be true that it's almost over, like Draco had said, it's not going to end the way we want it to.

I tug at the manacles that still, firmly, bind me to the filthy wall and try to find the voice to utter a prayer. A wish. A burning desire that just begs to find form in my lips. But my voice is gone; my throat had become raw and parched, so bone-deep from screaming. And crying. And hurting. And calling out for desist. I breathe in a mouthful of air, summoning even the ghost of my voice to console myself with a morale boost and a commendation for such a job well done of dying slowly, little by little in such a unique way that no one will dare attempt to do in the future. But nothing comes out of my mouth, cracked with gaping wounds that leave a rusty and tangy taste in my dry tongue.

I want water.

But I can't begin to imagine what I have to lose, what I have to endure, or what I have to surrender before I can be given something to drink in this place.

I crane my neck to see the sliver of light peeping from the barred window of my cell, high up on the same wall where my back is pressed. There is just the ghostly light of the afternoon and the foggy shadows of flora and fauna that I cannot see, and probably, will never see until I die, alone and miserable in my filthy paradise, nursing twisted notions of mercy and salvation, forgiveness and sacrifice, secrets and vows, vengeance and retribution.

I am such a pitiful creature. If people can see their messiah now, oh how they will weep for themselves and the lives of their loved ones who have already died, are dying and will die in the foreseeable future.

Someone clears his throat on the other side of the heavily bolted door and I look up from my self-pity. The menacing baritone starts to say something in hushed urgency, and the door opens to reveal a horde of hooded hooligans, hissing among themselves. They look at me through the darkness of their capes and I cringe at the effort I have to exert to appear unafraid. The men walk up to me and remove the shackles from my wrists. There is hushed tension, but tension nonetheless as they drag me roughly from the empty comfort of my prison. "Pick up your feet, Potter. We're going for a walk," a huge man mumbles at my left and practically shoves me, flying through the cell door.

The corridor is dark but eerie shadows dance on the stone walls, cast with yellow light from the fire torches propped on their holders on the wall. There is a soft pitter-patter of water along with the menacing thuds of heavy boots against the floor. Someone grabs my left forearm to hasten the march and I moan and wince in pain. The dagger wound there starts bleeding again. "Hurry it up, you!"

Clearing my throat as nonchalantly as possible, I steal a look at my escorts. Their jaws are set, tense and serious with doubt, maybe. Something is up, something serious enough to warrant a drastic change of plans. And I dread to know our destination—my destination.

Our party arrives at a winding stone staircase. Are they going to take me outside? The men yank at my tattered robes and push me up the stairs, their rough hands marking me anew and reopening bruises I thought had already healed. My feet hurt. My back hurts. And my chest hurts, along with the rest of my body. I reach out to try to support my jerky, disoriented walk by holding on to stones jutting out of the wall of the enclosed staircase. I am in absolutely no condition to walk but they would probably hear none of it. My knees are weak and shaking under me, and my legs feel like stiff boards. I take a huge swallow, tasting the tang of blood in my mouth. I would probably never, ever forget the taste of blood—then again, it's probably the last taste I'm ever going to have in my mouth before my inevitable end. "Where—" I start to speak, but a growl as good as silences my inquiry.

"Our master wants to have a word with you," says a calm but icy voice somewhere behind me. It sounds no more alarming than an overdue invitation for a cup of tea. But I know better. Voldemort tends to finish me off already.

Today.

There is no point keeping me alive anymore when he has just probably realized that he'd be getting nothing more than fancy and colorful cussing from me.

I breathe heavily, trying to keep the feeling of fear and foreboding in the pit of my guts. This is it.

I practically crawl up to the last step of the stairs. The moment my feet touch the dulled marble floor of a grand foyer, I shield my eyes from the brightness of the hall that I can't remember since I was unconscious when I was brought in nearly a month ago. And now, the first sighting of the grand vestibule of the obviously abandoned castle will also be my last.

I can't deny it. There is fear—there is always fear. Because all people fear at some point in their lives. There is definitely fear, but there is also surrender. Quiet resignation to a fate I had always known was mine. I wish I can see my friends again, even only for the last time so I can ask for their forgiveness, give them some heartfelt thanks that are long overdue and tell them that I love them. It's funny how sentimental people get when they are nearing the end of their lives. But there is nothing to be ashamed of. Death is always seen as that infinite moment to be able to right all wrongs, make amends… And I am piecing together the patchwork quilt that is my life, to be able to do just that. But for what purpose? For whom? When there is so much I have to make amends for. When there are so many people I have failed.

Hands roughly shove me to my right, to keep on marching to my waiting doom. The parlor door at the end of the huge hall is ajar, and I am pushed into it. I fall on the glass-strewn floor, face first and I grunt in pain. Someone snickers and snorts in amusement, in seeing the great Harry Potter fall on his face, swallowing a mouthful of dust and glass shards scattered by years past.

"Harry Potter," a chilly voice mutters, sounding so murky and garbled. I look up to wipe the grime off my face and the blood off my neck and collar and stand up to meet the cold red eyes, devoid of pity and of almost any other emotion that is distinctly human.

"This change of…treatment doesn't change anything, Voldemort. You can kiss my ass and have your Death Eater minions lick it up, too, but I'm not telling you, not even a hair's whisper, where Dumbledore is," I spew out, with the greatest mockery I can muster given my croaking voice, hoarse with screaming and my bloodied and swollen face.

I turn to all the Death Eaters there, one by one. They tighten what looks like a circle of hooded bodies around Voldemort. My escorts leave my side to assume their places in the circle. "Care to step in?" Voldemort invites. A man side-steps in front of me to form an entrance into the circle of minions sent from hell, waiting for me to step inside like I was asked to do. But I stay put, not moving any of my muscles searing with the utmost pain.

"Draco—do escort Mr. Harry Potter into our peer-group circle right here."

I gaze at Draco who immediately breaks the circle to carry out Voldemort's orders. His face is hidden beneath the dark folds of his hood. But I can tell he is tense and jerky as well. "Come on," he murmurs and touches my elbow softly to escort me very slowly into the circle of Voldemort's followers, as if he is taking all of his time.

I walk guardedly to the middle of the circle, face Voldemort and stand as dignified as I can given my filthy robes, my gaping wounds and my blackened body with bruises, dried blood and soot. "Dumbledore's location _will_ die with me, Voldemort," I mouth.

Draco, whose face is taut and tense when his hood slips to reveal his expression and shiny blonde hair, prepares to take his position in the circle again. But Voldemort calls him, "no wait, Draco—why don't you stand right here to keep Mr. Potter from trying to run from our clutches and-or falling flat on his face, whichever comes first," in the Dark Lord's sickly sweet but still freezing tone. Draco breathes a soft murmur but stands next to me nonetheless.

Voldemort, who looks happy and contented with the whole set-up, starts to speak, "you do realize that I've given you plenty of opportunity to redeem yourself and confess where Dumbledore is cowardly hidden, without tricking you and forcing Veritaserum upon you. But you, on the other hand, abuse that hospitality and stubbornly hold out on what we are keeping you here for. Why is that, Harry?"

You have got to be kidding me. "_Hospitality_? Sure. I guess you give yourself too much credit, _Voldemort_, if you keep it in _good faith_ that I'd actually _cooperate_ with you. You should have known better that I'd rather go to hell than sing like you want me to, but obviously you weren't smart enough in sizing me up, were you? Like I said, Dumbledore's location will die with me." I clench my fists at my sides and, for better measure, projectile-spit on the hem of his robes. Draco trembles slightly beside me but maybe it's just in my imagination. The Death Eaters leer and murmur softly at my daring. Well—you lot are looking at a dead man, so why bother with civility, right?

"You know, I think you refuse to talk because you are holding onto something," Voldemort speaks, mocking but amused, still in his sickeningly sweet voice. "Hope," he murmurs. He walks to face me and tilts my chin to lock his snake-like eyes with my dulled green ones. "I wonder, where you find hope in this place. I'm quite _curious_, actually."

He strays his cold eyes to Draco whose jaw is clenched so tightly, his teeth are quite audibly grinding within his mouth. His eyes are inscrutably focused on the sun, hanging low on the horizon that he looks as if he is missing the cold glare of suspicion from Voldemort's gaze. I narrow my eyes to will Draco to look at me, but his eyes remain focused on the sun slowly slipping in the horizon.

Voldemort knows. Voldemort knows that there is a traitor in his midst who's been helping me, who's been shielding my candle of hope against the gales of death that threaten to extinguish it even at great risk of getting burned. And now, Draco burns.

"In you, of course," I chortle. "Because I know, you won't be alive for long with or without me here. Dumbledore is the only one you've always feared, isn't he? So even if you kill me, it'll be just a brief hiatus in our interesting relationship for Dumbledore will be sending you after me, soon enough. And rest assured I will be waiting for you in the banks of the underworld, Voldemort." I finish with the utmost pride and joy at seeing Voldemort quiver with anger.

He raises a hand and slaps me across the face, "silence! Dumbledore hides behind you, boy. And you are telling me I am supposed to fear him when he can't even face me like a man but prefers to hide his whereabouts in your soul!"

"Convenient, isn't it?" I sneer. If I'm going to die, I will die with dignity, knowing that there is at least one person I didn't fail. Dumbledore will succeed and peace will reign. Someday. Even if I'm not there to see it anymore.

"Your friends are at the outskirts of the forest, waiting for the opportune time to burst in and rescue you, did you know that?" I freeze. I never should have put anything past Voldemort and now Draco will be endangered along with me.

"No," I try to lie. "But by the glint of your eye, I trust you have a plan so that they wouldn't be able to get to me alive. Well—what is one death to you, anyway? Oh don't get cold feet now. I've escaped you one too many times; your minions might think you've lost your touch if I escape you yet again. But mark my words, I may die today, but there will a different one tomorrow, a different hero to bring you down, and I _will_ see you in hell," I threaten. Draco is still unmoving in his stance, his eyes are hard and narrowed as if commanding the sun, which he is still looking at, to set.

Voldemort laughs, full of mirth and optimism that I will never see the way the sun will set today. "I won't be killing you, dear boy."

He turns his head to look at Draco who is still frozen, face glowing in the orange and pink explosion of the dying sun, eyes expressionless.

"Draco will."

Draco snaps out of his concentration and stares at Voldemort. If he had been shocked, he sure recovers fast, hiding his emotions behind a veil of indifference and stone-cold realization that he will be spilling my blood. Now, he burns, as a price for protecting my flame of hope. But he shall be the one to extinguish it in the end. No. It's surreal that everything Draco has sacrificed will be for nothing.

"And if I refuse to?" Draco—no. Don't include yourself in this.

Voldemort waves his wand, clutched in his hand and Narcissa Malfoy appears, bound in heavy chains and gagged, beside her husband. She falls on the ground with a muffled groan of pain and Lucius kneels by her side and seizes a handful of her disheveled blond hair, sticking a wand on her neck—directed on the pulse.

"No!" Draco starts for his fallen mother but Voldemort points his wand to Draco's face to quash whatever ideas the latter has.

"You must know that this is the price you have to pay for helping Potter, Draco. I trusted you. I gave you a chance. I kept your mother alive but for what? FOR WHAT? For you to stab me in the back in favor of Potter! I thought your mother means more to you than this. _Crucio!_" Voldemort hits Draco's mother with the spell, breathing heavily and eyes glowing with spite.

I turn my head away. I can't bear to see Draco at such suffering. He crumples and falls on his knees, sobbing, "no—stop it! She's innocent! Stop! She's all I have. Stop, please…"

"Then do what I command you to do. And your mother will be spared. You have shamed me, Draco. But I will let you rectify your mistake. Choose! Your mother's life or Potter's?" He snaps his fingers and a box appears in his hand. He opens it, lifts a double-edged dagger from the velvet folds and offers it to the stunned Draco.

You bastard! I cast my eyes down and close them. It all boils down to a sadistic choice then. And Draco has to choose between his mother's life and mine. Tears threaten to leak out my eyes, shut tight to block out the pain of the hanging question. I fight back a sob. It's inhuman.

"Do it." I whisper. I am faced with a choice as well, it seems. Between my life and Draco's as his mother silently sobs there, spent and almost lifeless with the Unforgivable curse just thrown her way. "Do it, Draco." I repeat; my voice is stronger this time.

Draco picks himself up and takes the dagger from Voldemort's outstretched hand. It is clear that the choice I am asking him to take is something he doesn't want to do. He never wanted to hurt me; I know that now. But what option is there left to take? "There is no greater honor for me than to die by your hands, right now, Draco," I mouth, tears forming in my eyes that dissolve the scene of the parlor with dark-hooded men in the dying embers of the sun, in the creeping of the cold fingers of night to a watercolor painting left out in the thunderstorm, distorted and meaningless. I face him, wanting to look into his eyes to tell him that everything will be all right. He'll just be doing whatever it is that needs to be done. It will be an inevitable end in the hands of the only person who has sacrificed so much to keep me from it.

"You don't want them to hurt your mother, so do it. And she will be spared," I croak. Draco's face is splotched with tears, and his eyes are grayer than stormy seas. He has to sacrifice one of us, so why shouldn't it be me?

"Spared? Spared to do what? Spared to experience what? More suffering? More pain because of being forced into a life that you don't want to have, to be a pawn in evil you never wanted to be a part of?"

Voldemort _must_ be enjoying this, immensely.

"Save her and save your life. I assure you, I will be dying exactly in the way I want to. In death, you are given a chance—a last chance—to make amends. And I have a lot to recompense with you. I thought you had betrayed us. And if you had come running back to me to explain what you were faced with and what you were forced to do, I would have killed you without a shadow of a doubt, without thinking how hard the times have been to you, without thinking that you never wanted to do those things. I doubted you, and I hated you. Not knowing that you will be my salvation in the end. You've always come through for me, Draco—and at great risk to your life and to those you love. I know how much you love your mother, how you want her to be free one day. And she will be—she will be. Now, I must do my part to help you in exchange for every sacrifice you had to do for me. Sacrifices that no one asked of you but you gave freely. This is mine." And I smile, in spite of my tears. I do hope Voldemort is enjoying the show. "Do it, to save us all."

"I c—can't. I can't do it."

"DO IT!" I holler. My shoulders are wracked with sobs now. It's almost over. I turn to look at Narcissa, crying and shaking her head, screaming beneath her gag. "Do it quickly, don't hesitate. If you don't, Voldemort will kill your mother. The story ends right here. There is no other option to take."

Draco looks at his sobbing mother. Lucius laughs and yanks the gag out of the woman's mouth, "Draco! No! Harry Potter is important to the Resistance! Don't play into their trap Draco! Let them kill me, I'm just making things hard for you. You wouldn't have killed those people and partook in evil if not for me—for your desire to protect me! I am a burden to you, son! I, as good as, forced you to become evil like them by letting them use me! No! Don't! Draco—no!" Lucius buries the wand deeper in the woman's throat and murmurs another Unforgivable.

"Do what I command you, Draco or your mother dies. I am getting restless. You are trying my patience! It will be easier I think if I just put Imperius on you, don't you think? But then I cannot assure that Potter will die with minimal pain and damage in your own hands commanded by _my_ will. Kill him, boy. Kill him with the poisoned blade. I want Potter to die as the sun dies. Draco—don't fail me now," Voldemort sneers.

Draco sobs in earnest now, clutching the dagger like a lifeline, possibly holding his own burning desire to plunge it repeatedly in Voldemort's sneering face. "No!" He covers his ears and cradles his head in his hands, confused and suffering.

I don't want you to suffer, Draco. You need not suffer for I am giving my life freely to save yours and your mother's and I wouldn't have it any other way. They say being a hero is to be glorified and worshipped. To be famous and loved and protected and admired. They say being a hero is hard but worth it. I don't know about all that jazz. I know what being a hero feels like. Sure—it gives you a lot of attention, but the essence of it? It's in the simplest things. Not Herculean tasks or Trojan wars of a thousand ships but right here in the pleasure and heroism of offering your life to save another's. It doesn't even have to be a famous person's life, but just a life—a friend's life. A life that you would willingly die for, for all the simple reasons.

And I owe you one again, Draco. For teaching me how to be a real hero.

"You don't have to suffer," I say calmly, walking towards Draco who is in a heap on the floor, possibly hoping to be swallowed by the ground whole. "Do as Voldemort says and it'll be over."

He looks up at me, tear stains on his pale cheeks. "I'm—I'm sorry, Harry. I failed you. I'm weak. I don't deserve to take your life, but I am given a choice and so I should choose." He picks up the dagger from the floor and stands up. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry."

And it is like a verdict and a prayer at the same time. And fear washes over me again. I wish there'll be no pain, but just the look of my slayer's eyes will be pain, the sublime pain that I will be taking to the other world with me.

"Draco! No!" Narcissa screams, but Draco has already chosen. I know—I can see it in his eyes. I'm giving my life to him and he's going to take it.

"I'm sorry, mother. I am weak—I'm always going to be. I'm sorry but I have to do this. Forgive me, mother. Forgive me."

Draco walks up to me and embraces me, and I close my eyes. It's a good thing, too that he won't be sending me off with the memory of his gray eyes. Make it quick, Draco. Both of us have suffered long enough. The play is about to end, like you promised in a way we're both going to have to accept. The cold blade of the dagger is on my side; I can feel its sharpness, its mercilessness.

Then he speaks, "I was wrong, Harry. Forgive me. But there _is_ an easy way out, you know, a choice I should have taken long ago. Goodbye Harry. I'm sorry." It's a farewell of sorts. He moves his hand away. I close my eyes tighter. I'm seeing a kaleidoscope of rainbow colors. Then there is an audible and foreboding swish of the dagger flying towards my body.

And it plunges. It digs deeper. There is no pain. There is only warmth on my sides. I catch my breath and freeze. This is dying. And yet I'm not dying. The figures of the cloaked people are still clear in my mind as the red train of the sun that has finally slipped beneath the horizon illuminates them. Draco, whose arm is still wrapped around me, gasps and crumples within my arms. The dagger is buried deep in his side, with dark pools blossoming on his black cloak like fire through dry underbrush. His breath comes in short, brutish gasps; his eyes clouding to a dull, dying gray.

Draco had stabbed himself.

_**-emeraldine-**_


	13. Chapter 13

**Rating:** PG for this part but it's going to get more violent**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** The penultimate chapter. The anguish is almost over. This is dedicated to **Kamille Alcantara** on her 18th birthday. Maligayang Bati, Insan!!!!

SALVATION: CHAPTER THIRTEEN

"Draco!"

Before Voldemort and the rest of the Death Eaters can react to the sight of the bloodied Draco, sprawled in his crimson blood, a blast issues from the parlor door that lay ajar. I drop down on my knees by Draco and shield his body from the rubbish that explodes into the room. Voldemort growls in fury and walks quickly to the blown-up door to welcome the unwanted company. Judging by his furious reaction and the sudden panic of his supporters, it _is_ unwanted company.

Snape suddenly bursts into the room and curses the hell out of the front-line defense of his former allies, and a lot of other Resistance fighters scurry right behind him. But my attention is not on the Resistance fighters but on the body wallowing in scarlet fluids and trembling in my arms. "Draco, why—"

Draco smiles at me and gently raises his bloodied hand to touch my face softly. "I had no choice. Didn't I tell you before that I would give my life to save yours? My life is worthless compared to yours and my mother knew it, too. There is nothing more left for us—for me—and I'd rather die than see my mother in her suffering, than see myself following evil I once abhorred. You understand, don't you Harry? I had to do it. I couldn't watch my mother die; I couldn't kill you when my life is all about protecting you. I picked the easy way out: death. An option I should have taken long ago than be a part of Voldemort's evil plans," Draco sputters.

A hand touches my shoulder and I steal a look behind me to see Hermione, shakily standing, clutching the fabric in tatters on my shoulder. "What h—"

Narcissa Malfoy practically crawls to the fallen body of her son, having been freed by the Resistance fighters that have come to rescue both his son and me. "My son, my son—" She murmurs, clutching Draco's hand in her own trembling one. Her hands, wrists and arms display a horrible variety of knife gashes, burn wounds, deep cuts and purple bruises leftover from tight ropes that used to harshly rub against the pale skin of her wrists. Her gaunt face is an image of sublime suffering as she sits there, cradling her son in her emaciated arms that don't really look fit to handle Draco's weight. "Your life is more precious than mine, my son. Your dreams of redemption are yet to be fulfilled—"

"He's not going to die," I interrupt. I turn my eyes to look into Draco's clouded gray ones and bite my lip. There are tears on my cheeks, cascading faster than I can stop them. Draco is not going to die. He'll live to see the defeat of Voldemort, the downfall of his father, the redemption he has always wanted—and hoped for. "You're not going to die. I will not let you die, Draco," I swear, vehemently. Draco softly drops his mother's hand and reaches out to find mine. He smiles tenderly, but cringes and gasps as if mere holding onto life is taking the life out of him.

"My story ends here, Harry. But not yours. You will defeat Voldemort, witness Lucius's fall from grace and avenge me…and redeem me. Because I gave up my life to extend yours, I will live in you and it's more than enough for me, Harry—to live in you, to live through you. The poison cannot be stopped by magic. It's going to make me pay for the lives I have taken exactly in the way that I deserve. I'm sorry for everything. I'm so, so sorry." Draco clutches the bloodstained hilt and handle of the double-edged sword, winces and withdraws his hand away. His gray eyes are full of fear, tinged with regret and stained with the rarest peace, peace that I have never seen before—not in him and not in me. He moves his hand to his upper leg and produces my wand from his trousers.

I stare at the wand he is offering to me. I pry it warily from his fingers and grip it so hard that it is quivering in the strength of my grip. Retribution—eleven inches, holly, phoenix tail feather. There's no chance like the present, Harry.

"Not as sorry as your father is going to be," I mouth. I carefully lay him, propped on his mother's lap and cast my eyes sideways to look at Hermione's fidgeting feet. "Take care of him. He _will_ live, Hermione—do you hear? Nothing is going to happen to him. I will catch you guys up."

"Where are you going?"

"Debts have to be paid," I quietly mouth. Lucius will pay. Big time. Then I'm going to take Voldemort to hell. I stand up, resolute and furious at being helpless while I watch my messiah wither away in front of me.

"H—Harry," Draco whispers and reaches out to tangle his fingers with the hem of my torn robes, pulling me back before I can even step away. "You don't have to."

"But I do, Draco. This is why you're going to live. You owe your father a spit on his grave."

Hang on, Draco. Hang on for me. I walk away and in the vestibule flooded with eerie firelight from the cinders of the blasted front door, I start to run. I don't know where my feet are going to take me, but I know that I pity the Death Eater that will be stupid enough to stand between me and Lucius's head. My body throbs with pain signals but I ignore them. The burning in the core of my soul is more than enough to fuel me to find the men who shoved Draco to consider taking his own life.

I hold out my wand guardedly in front of me and run, my feet painfully pounding against the rough stone floor. My eyes sting not because of the light from burning doors and ricocheting spells of dueling wizards but because of the red haze of wrath and overdue revenge for innocent people. For my parents. For Draco.

I yank my tattered robes from my body and throw it hastily away. Anything that is slowing me down has to go. Two cloaked Death Eaters flit from the room ahead to run, hurriedly in front of me. And I run after them, roaring curses under my breath.

One of them turns to see me sprinting a few uncomfortable paces behind them, and he carelessly throws a curse behind him. I duck as the torch holder a hair's breath away explodes and scatters fiery ash and slow me down a bit. "_Carpe Evanescum!_" The recipient of my hex vanishes in a wisp of black smoke ahead of me and it does the trick to rejuvenate me to find my targets.

"Run! Run to your master! I am right behind you!" I holler, unconsciously grasping my wand near breaking point.

What will I find after I kill Voldemort and Lucius? Who will gladly receive Lucius's head after I kill him? What if Draco—

No! I scream in my head. Draco is not going to die. He will live and he will be part of the Resistance again. He will be welcomed back and he will accompany me to new cities, new settlements every week and plan with me, kill Dark Wizards with me. Just—be with me. Like he was with me for the darkest month of my life. When I get back, Draco will be there waiting for me, pale but alive. He will walk with me to where Lucius's body had fallen, and he and I will spit on his father's dead body together, as revenge for all the things the two of us had had to go through.

The Death Eater in front of me turns but I am right on his tail. When I enter the door that the hooded Dark Wizard I had been pursuing went through, I freeze for a while, looking into Voldemort's face momentarily before the latter disappears along with the Death Eater I had been following. Shit!

"_Expelliarmus!_" The two had escaped but still a wand flies to my waiting grasp. Lucius freezes, eyes panicked and wide, wandless. Looking very vulnerable.

"Is the traitor dead?" The older Malfoy asks haughtily.

"That traitor is your _son_! You bastard!"

"I have no son!"

I tremble with pent-up anger, and I raise my wand at shoulder level, eyes blazing. "And he doesn't have a father like you! _Manicas Salae!_" Heavy gold manacles attached to an equally heavy steel sphere appear out of thin air and bind Lucius, rendering him incapable of movement other than fidgeting and twiddling his members.

"Going to torture me, Potter?"

"No. I'm going to kill you, actually."

"Killing me won't bring Draco back," Lucius spits out, in his airy manner given than he is bent over so low in negotiating his heavy manacles.

"Draco is not dead! And he's going to live a long time tirelessly working against you and others like you, you piece of vermin." I stride to him and seize a handful of his long blonde hair to force him to meet my blazing eyes. "I will enjoy killing you, Lucius. If only I could kill you over and over again," I hiss to his face. "But before that, I will extract some dues from you—" I connect my knee to his chest as hard as is possible and he doubles over, obviously hurting.

"Fuck you, Potter!"

"No Lucius—Fuck _you_!" And I punch his wincing face with my bruised knuckles, not minding the pain that surges through my body from my hands. "That was for my parents, by the way."

Draco will not die. Draco will not die. He will be in the entrance hall of the abandoned castle when I get back. I will not let him die. I will not let go of him. Just the thought of losing Draco feels like being whipped again, being castrated, being tortured into the depths of hell. No—I will not let Draco go. If I have to kill Lucius again and again to ensure that Draco will live, I will.

I kick Lucius in the groin, reveling in the pleasure of hearing him groan in pain, "this is for me!"

Over.

"This is for Arthur Weasley!"

And over.

"This is for Seamus!"

And over.

"This is for Neville!"

Again.

"This is for all the people you've hurt!"

And again.

By the time my mind is clear with how I'm going to finish this bastard in front of me, Lucius is a cringing bit of filth at my feet, softly weeping in pain. One of his eyes is swollen shut and his nose appears broken. I seize his hair again and put the tip of my wand on his temple, "this is for your wife." I whisper the first hurting spell that came to my mind, "_Crucio!_"

I am shaking. Not because of fear but because of the pain and hate that it is actually me who has to extract the payment from Lucius. And not Draco—like he should be doing—like he has always wanted to do.

The blonde man starts sputtering and convulsing whether with fear due to impending death or humiliation by being on his knees in front of me, I don't know. "And now for the grand finale… I have the great honor of killing you, Lucius Malfoy."

"Don't Harry! Don't kill me! It's not really me you want, is it? Lord Voldemort, it's Lord Voldemort! Spare me, Harry please!"

"You've no shame in begging for my mercy. Voldemort will pay, but you're for today, Malfoy." I yank at his hair to lock his eyes with mine; my wand is then firmly placed on his temple. "Look at me when I take your life. This is for Draco!"

His eyes widen at what I am about to do. "_Bombarda Craniumvellus!_"

Lucius's head explodes inside and his eyes remain focused on me as they dull, die and then fill with blood from his blasted skull. The dead man's fingers' grasp on the blood-soaked hem of my torn trousers, stained with blood of both Draco and Lucius, loosens and I step away, breathing heavily.

"It's done, Draco."

And I break into a run again, half-blinded by tears of fear and impending loss. But there is nothing to cry about. Draco is alive. And Lucius is dead—Draco and his mother are free. I am free as well.

Rain had started falling; clouds are thick and heavy with water—shielding the stars, making everything unnaturally dark and gloomy. The sky cries right after the sun had died. Rumbling hooves and thundering carriage wheels echo throughout the forest like curses. Death curses. Plunging knives. Whispered apologies. Beating hearts. "Harry!" A girl's voice screams. "Harry!"

Silence. A carriage rumbles in front of me as I stumble through thickets, blindly searching for Draco's heartbeats, the glow of the gold-spun hair.

I jump on the carriage and see Draco again, deathly pale, lips white and eyes hollow. "I've avenged you. You're free. You can't die—I need you."

I don't know what came over me, whispering about death. Draco will live, of course. Draco reaches out to me and smiles wistfully again. The veins on his neck are bright red with pulsing blood, poisoned blood. "I need you," I murmur again, enclosing the frail hand in mine. I am beside him in a flash, holding and supporting him with what's left of my own strength.

"I wanted to have a chance to properly say goodbye," Draco croaks. His mother and Hermione had obviously lost all power to assure him and cry for his sacrifice.

"You're not going anywhere. Not now. When we're both free. Lucius is dead, Draco. It's over."

Draco squeezes my hand just as Hermione stifles a loud sob and Narcissa looks away. The rain is no longer a light touch; the drizzle turns to a tempest. Like the raging rapids of my heart. He places it to his chest where the faintest heartbeats can still be felt.

It is then hard to tell where the raindrops end and my tears begin. Where my dreams finish and my lament starts. Where my own weakness succeeds and Draco's battle for life fails.

_No…_

_**-emeraldine-**  
_


	14. Chapter 14

**Rating:** PG for this part.**  
Disclaimer:** No profit is being made out of this and no copyright infringement intended.**  
Category: **Drama, Romance**  
Notes:** Author's Note at the end. The big moment is next week. I will know once and for all whether I will become a lawyer or not... This is for **Ian and Yvette Lustre**.

SALVATION: CHAPTER FOURTEEN

_I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,  
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.  
I do not love you as certain dark things are to be loved,  
in secret, between the shadow and the soul._

I love you as the plant that never blooms  
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;  
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance ,  
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

_I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.  
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;  
so I love you because I know no other way_

_than this: where __**I**__ does not exist, nor __**you**__,  
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,  
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep._

_- Pablo Neruda  
_

"Draco, don't leave me. I need you," I whisper, pleadingly. Because I do. I do need him. I've never needed anybody more than I need him. And it scares me that my need is not enough to keep him here, with me. "I need you here with me. Don't do this," I murmur, fighting the rage of the storm, my tears mingling with the tasteless raindrops. But I realize that they're actually bitter. So bitter. Bitter as the times I spent hating Draco—bitter and tangy as the times I spent hating myself for needing him so much and yet not having enough power to keep him beside me. And like before, I fall powerless again. To keep Draco with me, where he has always belonged.

"You'll always have me. I'll be living through you, Harry. And it'll be enough. I just—" Draco pauses, takes a deep breath. He is fighting death; I know it—I can see it in his slowly dulling gray eyes. But I see resignation, too. Fear and resignation. Acceptance to his fate. I clutch his cold hand within mine, harder, crushing his fingers in my palm. I raise it and put it on my chest, where my heart beats through my ribs, through my flesh, my skin, my bloodied and torn clothes. I twist my neck and command the man in front of the carriage to keep on driving. The whip lashes through the fierce anguish of peals of thunder, and the carriage lurches forward. The wheels underneath us crunch the gravel and slick through the mud. Death will never catch up and take Draco from me.

Never.

"Hang on, Draco. I'm not letting you go. Do you hear me? I'm not letting you go."

Draco sputters and coughs, his hoarse breaths rising above the din of showering water and roaring thunders, filling my ears and my being with regret. With loss, with sadness. Though my hands still enclose his, it slowly dawns on me that this is something I can never defeat, something I can never hang on to. And the regret slowly fills my heart. My brain. My soul. My memories. My everything.

It's fucking unfair. It's fucking unfair that I sit here cradling this wonderful creature in my arms, virtually unhurt and breathing normally while he struggles for his life. It's fucking unfair that I sit here having everything Draco has always wanted—freedom, revenge, life, future. "Harry, I can't hear the rain falling. I can't hear your heart beating. Stop the carriage. Please…just…stop."

Hermione was bawling like a newborn already. And her soft sniffles comes to my ears again as the carriage painstakingly slows to a stop. The rain is blinding me, and yet I've never seen everything this clear before. Draco's luminescent skin, his gray eyes, his wistful and agonizing smile, the vestiges of his warmth within his clammy and rain-slicked hands, his soundless tears, his crimson blood—blood he let flow to save me. "I want to save you. I don't want to sit here, having everything both of us deserve without doing anything to save the one person who's always been there to be my hero. I don't want to let you go, Draco. There are so many things I still want to share with you, so many things I want to say." I'm crying now. Crying for lives lost, pasts ruined and futures unseen.

I cry because I know I'm losing Draco again. And when I do, I'll never find him and get him back.

He starts to sob, catching his laborious breaths with every inhale of the humid and freezing air in the gray fingers of the storm. "Can you ever forgive me, Harry? Will you ever find the heart to forgive me for every bad choice I had taken? Can you forgive me before I die?

"An old man told me that it is only in death that a person can make amends. He told me that before I killed him. And I believe him, Harry. It is only in death that one can make amends. It is only now that I may find the heart to forgive myself. Now—I'm asking you, will you forgive me?"

"Yes," I whisper softly, boring my eyes deep into his pooling gray ones. "Yes. How can I not forgive you? You, who have shown me that hope could be found in the most unlikely places."

Draco closes his eyes and smiles, his own tears mixing with the showers from above. He pulls his hand away from my chest, clutches my own palm and places it on his chest above his humming heart. "Goodbye, Harry. I love you. Very much."

And I freeze. In that infinitesimal moment of hearing it in Draco's hoarse and gasping breath, I stop breathing myself . As if it has started raining Galleons and I had been knocked unconscious by a nasty one that had fallen on the top of my head.

"I love you, Harry. And I will die loving you," Draco murmurs, barely audible. But to me, it's like a prayer. Something that drowned out the heavens in its rage and the blood pumping through my temples. "Draco, I—"

"Take care of my mother for me, Harry. Love her like your own. Don't remember me this way. Remember me in those happy times we used to spend running through Hogwarts together, living life—not like this. I love you so much; I just wish I had told you sooner, how you make my life complete, how every minute feels like a blessing—a gift, how you make me love you more every day, how you affirm me in the way my whole being lives and dies by your every word. I love you so much and I will never have my life any other way…than this—I'd choose to die like this over and over if need be if it means your face, and your eyes will be the last thing I'd see…and take with me. I will always love you, Harry Potter." Draco's tears blink at me for an infinite moment before joining the glimmering sheen of rain on his pale face.

I bite back a noisy sob, a pained cry. I never knew. How come I never knew?

Draco closes his eyes with a smile. His grip loosens on my slippery hand; his head droops to the side and bumps against my leg. Cold. Deathly cold. The last of his breaths is like the last flicker of a candle in the rain before meeting a drop of heaven's tears. Hermione stuffs her whole fist over her mouth to stifle her cry. Narcissa slumps to the side of the carriage, lightly calling Draco's name. Lightning momentarily illuminates the woods and then cracks of thunder follow, wracking the inner core of my soul and opening the floodgates I had kept tightly closed,. I exhale sharply, cold rain mingling with hot disbelieving tears. I clutch the fabric of his chest where my hand is; no faint beating, no humming—

I scrunch his clothes and lower my head to look at the gaping wound on his side. I sob. I sob. I just cry. I—I am holding back. I refuse to believe. "Draco—" I murmur. "Wake up, Draco. Don't do this to me. Don't leave me."

But Draco is still. Unmoving. Flashes of lightning. Roars of thunder and tears of heaven. I lift my head and slowly touch his cheek. It's cold. So cold, like my insides. He's gone.

Draco's gone.

I touch his neck and raise his upper torso towards my chest, fiercely. I crush his body close to my beating heart, close to my warmth, crying for everything I had done and didn't do, everything I said and left unsaid. "DRACO!!!!!" I call, blinded by tears and destroyed by pain. "DRACO!!!!" My voice rips through the darkened woods, the darkened skies, above the din of the roaring storm, above the screeching of my helpless soul. Echoing. Mocking its own uselessness.

I hold the back of his head in my hand, his cheek against the side of my face, where the rain showers wash the tears away as they pour.

Tangling my fingers within his wet hair, I wrap my other arm around his sides; I hold his back, cradling his body and rocking him like a child. Rocking my own fears and tears away. Drowning in the hollowness of my unheard cries. Because Draco can no longer hear them. Draco can no longer feel my arms around him, shielding him from pain, seven months too late.

"I need you," I whisper again. It's futile; I know.

I kiss his forehead, his cheek, tracing the path his tears of seven months had probably taken. Burying my face on the crook of his shoulders, I cry more. My tears will never dry. My pain will never dull. Not while Draco's sacrifice is in my memory—in my heart…

"You never even got to hear what I have to say, Draco." And the ache squeezes my insides again. All those months of finding a companion in him, all that pain from his betrayal, all that fear for his risks, all the tears for his sacrifice—and he never even got to hear it…

"I love you, too Draco. I will love you until I see you and be with you again," I choke back the tears as I whisper in his ear.

I clutch him close to me and cry along with the heavens. It's unfair. It's inhuman. To need somebody this much and to live the rest of my life without him.

THE END

_**Thanks to, as usual, the best people in the world, hpssfan and kaith for your faith and unconditional friendship. The big moment is next week and I will, basically, be incoherent until I know once and for all what my future is going to be.**_

_**This story is very much outside of my comfort zone. You probably noticed how it different it is from DREAMCATCHER. Now that is the very cul-de-sac of my comfort zone. But as a writer, we can't always write in our comfort zones. We have to make room for adventure and a taste of the extraordinary. Hence, I decided to write and post this one. It might not have gotten the same warm response as DREAMCATCHER, but I am, nonetheless, proud that I finished this and found the courage to post it. This was VERY DIFFICULT to write, let me tell you. From the very beginning to the end, it presented such a challenge to me on all aspects and all levels. I hope you felt the depression, pain and hope [in spite of it all] in every word and description in this story as I did while writing [and editing] it.**_

_**Thanks for everyone who made their presence known. Appreciate it... Hopefully, the next time I post a story here, I'm already a full-pledged lawyer. See you soon, guys! Thanks a bunch again!!!**_

_**-emeraldine-  
**_


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